Time/Fall Back

UK daylight savings time (a.k.a. British Summer Time) ends this weekend, and I’m delighted. Why? Well, I love an extra hour. I could use one more often. “Fall Back” time has always been a happy time for me. But never so much as when I moved abroad. The first thing that is immediately noticeable is that the US does not switch at the same time, so there is a magical week of decreased time differences: 4 hours to the east coast instead of 5. Five to Minneapolis instead of 6. I love this. We get a few magical weeks each year in the spring and in the fall when this happens. I wish we could maintain the shorter time difference always, and I panic at the thought of the proposals to equalize the UK with European time and permanently move forward an hour, thus increasing the difference to 6 hours UK-east coast. Hopefully the UK-France animosity will prevent such an equalization and the Eurosceptics will prevail in this one small thing.

But this line of argument reflects the overall expat existence in some ways. I don’t live in British time. I live in some strange mid-Atlantic time-zone between here and there. The east coast is normally 5 hours, from me, the midwest 6, my colleagues in Colorado 7. I don’t seem to have many working relationships at 8 hours away in California, but I know it’s there. In general, these time differences are an automatic subtraction when I look at my watch and think about who I need to talk to and what I need to say. Fortunately I have a relatively flexible job in terms of the timing, and as a result I don’t normally book appointments before 10 am. And I often don’t “down tools” until 8 or 10 pm. I don’t religiously work a New York day, but I’m definitely closer to that than to a typical working day for those around me in the UK (although thank goodness 8 am starts are not the norm here, in that I do NOT miss Minnesota!)

That said, I have the intrinsic tendency to be slightly nocturnal, and sometimes this does not help. The time zone shift provides me an excuse for not integrating into UK time as well as I should. When I have to do something at 8:30 am (as early as I’ve been asked to do when not travelling) I’m pissy and resentful, because you can bet I was not in bed before 1 am (8 pm on the east coast!) It’s a delicate balance. And I’m eager to hear from readers–on both sides of the pond–how they accommodate this moderate but not insignificant time difference. Is it a help or a hindrance? Is it better to be in China (as my sister is) and be completely shifted in the US, or is it good to have this evening window both in the US and UK where people can overlap in timing, as long as the US person gets home from work early and the UK person manages to stay awake late?

Coffee

Apparently, and I say apparently because I have no personal knowledge, Starbucks is marketing a new instant coffee called “Via” which is, clearly to those of us living in the UK, pure evil. Instant coffee = not an excuse for real coffee. Stop now. England is already full of people who do not know the taste of real coffee or the difference between real coffee and instant, so we do not need to play this game. Coffee? Yes, I’m a coffee nut and I’ll have a real coffee every time.

Living in a Nanny State, Literally!

The big news around Britain in the last 24 hours has been a crack-down by Ofsted, the government department that looks out for kids, on “reciprocal childcare agreements” or people trading off watching each others’ kids when two mothers both are working part-time. Better to quote the article to explain:

England’s Children’s Minister is reviewing the case of two police officers told they were breaking the law, caring for each other’s children.

Ofsted said the arrangement contravened the Childcare Act because it lasted for longer than two hours a day, and constituted receiving “a reward”.

It said the women would have to be registered as childminders.

Now this rankles for several reasons. It comes immediately on the heels of the furore over whether people would have to be registered in the “vetting and barring” scheme meant to prevent pedophiles from having access to children–the official policy came down that the rules applied to people like cub scout carpool drivers, thus causing most parents to have to be registered if they did anything other than ferry their own brood around town. Now we have a similar issue with trading off babysitting, where a person would be required to be registered as a “childminder” and have a criminal background check. More importantly, it defies logic by not allowing parents to choose what is best for their own children, but to leave this to the government.

All of these recent perhaps well-meaning but overzealous laws leave me mighty glad that I don’t have children, and tending towards a view of staying away from people who have them–the legal requirements associated with being in the same car or the same room are clearly becoming too stringent. But it does sort of refine my view of the phrase “nanny state” when the government starts trying to tell you that you cannot ask a friend to watch your kids or drive them around without government interference, and the risk that your friend is breaking a completely over-the-top interpretation of the law. Or perhaps we’ve got a set of lawmakers, and laws, who are determined to keep women in the home minding their own children and not out running the country. Just saying.

And yes, I said interpretation, the word this morning is that the government might be investigating the particular wording that caused Ofsted to “bust” these perps (ironically, both female COPS) for their shared childcare arrangement. There’s even a petition that you can sign online if you’re a Brit by birth or residence, the link is here in case you’re interested.

Update: further reading on the BBC identifies a tantalizing piece of information as concerns Ofsted’s motivations for policing this issue:

Registered childminders must pay an annual fee of £103 to Ofsted.

Got it. We now have a situation that perfectly parallels the heavy-handed enforcement of the TV license rules, except now it’s for your kids. Maybe that’s the next step, a required childbearing license?

Keep calm and carry on

The title of this post is a classic British-ism, and I think it’s one that is particularly good when it comes to advice to expats. If I had to summarize my experiences as a nearly 3-year resident of Britain, particularly as concerns my job, it would be this, to note this difference in attitude between my British work colleagues and American colleagues in previous jobs. I have mentioned before that the locals do not seem to have any experience in the American art of “venting“. I have been surprised on a number of occasions how the things I’ve said when “venting” have come back to me, perhaps not to “haunt” me per se, but certainly to make me aware that my toss-aside comments have been taken seriously and noted in some large record of my time spent working in England. And I’m not sure how to fix this one. I would never advise a young colleague not to “vent” about their frustrations and experiences, but I would certainly advise him or her that these “vents” will remain on their record and be taken seriously in a way that I would not have expected based on my prior work experiences in America.

I’m not quite sure what the problem is. I don’t know if my colleagues bristle at the implied criticism at the way things are done here, or if my speaking up is generally considered to be “too much” … I do know that as a personal foible I tend to relate too much detail about things when confronted with general assemblies, but I am interested in the fact that these details are apparently retained in some master list of things I have said. Regardless, it does create a situation where I try to watch every word I utter, sometimes with great personal difficulty as my typical “get it out there” behavior is suppressed. It’s one of the many and varied, albeit interesting, culture differences that I could only define as “subtle” and not something I expected to experience on my transition from US to UK life.

Home thoughts from abroad

Perceptions. I’m interested in how one perceives their adopted country from their native country. I’ve been back but 2.5 days, roughly. I’ve had meetings in the office, emails to catch up on, planning to do for the next few months at work. I had a big deal work dinner tonight in which I got to see many good “professional friends,” people with whom I work but with whom I actually have come to learn to love to play with as well. Amazingly, I’ve found that after a few days, I’ve been happy to be back. Happier than I was expecting. And more “home” than I was expecting. So the question is, why am I so pessimistic about my life in the UK when I’m back in the US, and why am I so unexpectedly happy in the UK once I’m actually here?

I didn’t expect it. I arrived back veiled in a pessimistic funk. I admit it. How could I not? Being in America was so comfortable. I felt so home-y. I was also doing my beach vacation thing, my go-to-Minnesota thing, my road-trip in a car thing. My shopping thing, my familiar food thing, my reading books about Americana thing. And it was easy to ignore the things that I do like about England. Even the things that I prefer about England. (Ask me how many times I get asked about American Healthcare Reform in my current UK existence…)

I’m interested to hear what other expats think. When you’re back in your native country, do you feel melancholic about your adopted country? What is your average level of stress on return from your native land? Are you happy to be back immediately, or does it take you (like it takes me) a few days to remember that your new life in your adopted country is pretty good? How do you strike the balance? What is too much time away, too much time in your native country such that you forget what you like about your new land?

Good food, fast

Several times in the last few days, fast food has come up in the comments of this blog. Apparently this is one of the evils of America that is worthy of scorn. It’s actually one of the things I miss most about the states. Not fast food of the McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Arby’s variety. Okay, I admit it, my homesick self has been spotted in my local McDonald’s on more than one occasion. I’m more interested in the “good food fast” idea that has dominated recent American quick food options. I miss bagel shops, which worked equally well for lunch and for breakfast/brunch. I miss Chipotle, Panera, Qdoba, Noodles and Co., all of the modern quick food places that have gone into most American strip malls in the last few years. Virginia was particularly good for this, there were several local ma-and-pa places too, a falafel joint, a steamed buns and noodles cheap Chinese place. Places where you could get a decent, healthful and fast meal for take-away. I have blogged before about how I do poorly with pre-prepared sandwiches, which appear to me to be the only UK equivalent in my neighborhood. The up-market take-out places in my local vicinity are all specialist sandwich shops, Pret-a-Manger and of course the M&S Foodhall. I have discovered a few things I can eat at Pret, like veggie sushi and some of the salads. But it’s a long walk from work–these places are all closer to home than work. Work has a “canteen” that primarily sells… wait for it… prepared sandwiches.

I will go on the defensive now and state that there is nothing wrong with sandwiches for most people. I just have a “soggy bread” personal issue that is well known in my family. If I get a burger I have to ask for it to be off the bun. I can’t do wet bread. I have a gag reflex. It’s not a British thing, it’s just a personal problem. So I have taken to packing a lunch for work. And the irony is that it often includes a sandwich. Although one that is either totally dry (bread-cheese-bread) or deconstructed (bread and stuff in separate containers, to be assembled in real time). The canteen at work has been amazing, in taking a “special order” for me with a plain cheese sandwich when we have work meetings. I’m fortunate. But it does not mean that I do not wish that there was an easier local option for lunch food near my work. So I think back on the halcyon days in America, when I had easy access to a bagel shop, or a falafel place, or a Panera. And yes, I never had a sandwich I liked at Panera. I only ever ordered the soups and salads.

And so it goes

It is almost too perfect. I’ve been complaining about my flat, ornery about it, but on my return I found it was even better than the simple, mundane things I had been complaining about, the lack of modern conveniences. I arrived “home” in the UK this afternoon and received an email about 1 pm or so from my landlord’s housekeeping service to say that there would be no hot water tomorrow morning from 8 to 11 am. OK, I thought, I can do this, bath tonight or early tomorrow, no problem. Still easy to make coffee, brush teeth, etc. I then went down to get my mail, and found a sign on the door, it said “no hot water, no cold water”. Hmmm. So I emailed back the housekeeping people and asked for clarification. They came back to me and said, yes–actually there would be no water at all tomorrow morning. I wrote back and asked if they had a suggestion on where I could find some facilities to use in the absence of my own bathroom. And then nothing. They did not answer.

Right. Got it. So I’ve just come off the trans-Atlantic flight, to an apartment with no water on my first morning home. No showers, no sinks, no toilet, no nothing from 8 am. And I’m not sure I believe the anticipated 11 am return of water, based on previous experience with prior maintenance projects in my building. Regular readers of this blog may think this sounds sort of familiar. They might remember the month across December and January when I was not allowed to sleep in my flat for a month, when fortunately I had planned ahead of time to spend three weeks in Australia, but stayed in a hotel both before and after my trip. And I stayed there for longer on my return than had been planned, as the re-wiring took “longer than expected”. I anticipate that happening tomorrow as well. I’m hoping for water by dinner. I’m planning my back up plan (there are showers at the gym…)

I will work around all of it, of course, get up early, get into the office bright and shiny. I’ll probably hit jet lag at 2 pm and be fast asleep at my desk. It will probably actually help the jet-lag problem and the time-zone reacclimation, the forced early start. And don’t worry, I’m more annoyed at my own inconvenience here, especially in light of the fact that I had just been complaining about my flat. I’m not actually trying to claim that this is a big US/UK thing. I actually did have a water shut-off in the US in one of my apartments. although it had been planned long in advance, and I had not been travelling internationally at the time, and I was able to plan and camp out elsewhere. It’s one of those things that crosses cultures, the annoying things that landlords do. (And for another really good landlord rant see Mike’s recent post here.) I’ll be fine. It’s just not quite the comfortable homecoming I had been hoping for.

Minneapolis update

I was going to write a post about the bittersweet nature of being home in Minnesota, but then I realized I had written it already–last year at this time, when I experienced the same sorts of ups and downs about being here. Read it here. So that’s the emotional update, that made it much easier than trying to write the words fresh. I guess in some ways that is why I don’t spend much time here anymore, much to the chagrin of my family. It’s just a bit too much.

So that said, what have I actually been doing?

• Staying with my best friend in her awesome new digs near uptown but in the part where grown-ups actually live.

• Bought an amazing photo of the old Uptown theater, at the Uptown Art Fair last weekend. Seemed appropriate. And it’s one of those photos that, if you know what it is, it’s awesome, and otherwise it just looks nice.
• Took what must sound like a totally random brief road trip to Madison with my sister. Had a three hour work meeting and then sis and I went on the town, stayed overnight and came right back. If you’re in Madison, check out Harvest Restaurant, it rocked.
• Played lots of Scrabble with my nonagenarian grandmother and her caretaker, who happens to be my dad’s older sister. When my sister’s not playing too, I can win occasionally. When the sis is there, I get crushed every time. Grandma does the scorekeeping and you have to keep a close eye on her or she’ll deprive herself of deserved points
• Had dinner with another good friend and her little girl, now almost 4. There are still a few very good friends here (as well as a large number of facebook friends!) and I don’t do a perfect job of catching everyone when I’m in town, but I try my best. This particular friend has an edge since she lives six blocks from Grandma, so I’m always lurking about her neighborhood!
• Drove over the new 35W bridge, tried to view it from the side from the Stone Arch bridge and decided it is so undistinguished and indistinguishable that you cannot even clearly see it in the photographs, it just blends into the scenery. Not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.
• Bought a few random toiletries at Target

Off to spend my last full day here with the parents and sister, with perhaps one more stop off at Grandma’s. Going to walk around Lake Calhoun in the sunshine, meet my parents’ new dog, and probably eat just a bit too much at newer restaurants in the area. And try to stay busy so as not to dwell on the melancholy or bittersweet feelings, but just enjoy the sunshine.

I like to be in America

It’s amazing that I have been here more than a week and a half already, and have been through three main stages of the trip. Part of the nature of my whirlwind start to this trip was due to the fact that I was traveling with a junior colleague. I wanted to show her an awesome and multi-faceted technical experience as well as a bit of my country, as long as we were here. So after working solidly all weekend, Tuesday was the day for a bit of fun, and we went to pay tribute to a few of my favorites in the Nation’s capital. Almost first was Einstein, but I was so busy taking photos of my colleague in his lap that I forgot to take a photo myself. On to Lincoln.

Washington.

And my personal favorite, Jefferson.

Inspiring stuff. I was never quite so patriotic before I moved to England.

From there it was over to Georgetown for lunch and shopping on M street. I think I showed my colleague a nice day in DC, and for me it was nostalgic to be back in my old haunts.

Immigration rules

Not, as in, immigration is awesome, but more as in immigration means there are a whole new set of rules out there. I’m coming up on my 3rd anniversary in the UK and it would probably not be as easy for me to move here now as it was 3 years ago (and that’s not saying it was easy…) Read today’s blog post by Mary Beard about how the new rules might affect British higher education. And do comment, would you have made it under the new rules? I’m probably close to eligible, although the “cash in the bank” rule might have been a problem. Still would be now, and yet I’ve managed to live here without ever having gone overdrawn. And I want to know who chose the arbitrary figures of GBP800 for 3 months as being a significant stock of cash sufficient for migration to another country for a job. Strange. But seriously, the climate in the UK for overseas workers seems to be changing quickly, has anyone else noticed it???