Where is My Handbook?

The process of moving to South Africa was not easy. It was logistically challenging. The visa business was frustrating and caused a lot of angst. However, when I think back to that time, right before we left the USA and came to South Africa, my most prominent emotion was excitement. We were about to embark on a new life and I couldn't wait to get started. We laughed off the delays and challenges. It was all a big adventure.

Leaving South Africa does not feel like an adventure. It feels awful. I would love to put a positive spin on it for you and say something like, "onward and upward" or "change is good" but I can't. What I can say is, "I'm sure it will be fine." That's the best I can do. But I'm not a huge fan of fine. I prefer amazing. 

Intellectually my sadness about leaving makes no sense. How can it be harder to leave a country where I've lived for just over two years than it was to leave a country where I'd lived my entire life? How can it be harder to leave a place where things don't work all that well for a place where everything works? What could possibly be so difficult about going back to America where everyone will understand me when I speak and where I can eat tacos and drink Starbucks with reckless abandon? Not to mention being closer to family and friends.  Side note, what is wrong with me that I listed tacos before mentioning family and friends? 

When we arrived in South Africa, our relocation agent gave us a book called "Living in South Africa." Of course I never actually READ this book, but the point is there WAS A BOOK about newly arrived expat adjustment. So where is the handbook that details best practises for expats trying to depart a place gracefully? Because I have a lot of questions. 

Some of the questions are trivial, yet real. How will I survive without the constant sunshine, palm trees and smiling security guards who greet me every morning and then ask me to buy them a 2 litre Coke and loaf of bread? How will I manage without my clean house and my perfectly ironed and folded clothes made so by the world's kindest and sweetest person? What about the kids that I teach? Will they forget about me after five minutes (answer is yes being that they are eight years old.) Most importantly, how am I supposed to say goodbye to all the people here who I love...my second family, some of whom, if I'm being honest with myself, I may never see again. 

Mr. Deep has gone already. He is in Geneva working on a project for the next few months. While I am here alone for what simultaneously feels like forever and not nearly long enough, he was "ripped out of here."  Maybe that was the way to go? To leave quickly. Maybe I should have gone with him? Maybe I should have insisted on being an excellent wife and standing by my man, literally. I wonder what the non-existent expat departure handbook would have suggested I do?

I have watched other expat friends leave over the years. Some were life long expats and some were not. All were very stoic and said things like, "here's to the next adventure" which leads me to wonder, is that how they really felt? Maybe they were ready to leave and could barely contain their excitement? Maybe South Africa was getting to them and they were tired of trying to find spare change every minute for car guards, constantly sitting in traffic because of broken traffic lights, and having to visit three stores each time they wanted to buy kale? Or maybe it was breaking their hearts to leave and in the privacy of their own homes they cried a lot and got drunk every night under the guise of having to drink all of their South African wine before the movers arrived? It's hard to know. 

The thing about expat life is when it's time to go it's time go whether you want to or not and conversely for some who wish to leave it's not time to go and they have to stay. This is what we all signed on for. I guess if there were an expat departure handbook, that is what it would say. It would be a very short book. 

Impressions

I write a lot about my experiences in South Africa that I find interesting and unusual. This time I am going to turn the tables a bit. We are back in the U.S.A. for ten days. Here are a few observations.

We landed in New York City on a beautiful August day. Whenever I visit New York in the summer I need to remind myself of one word...January. Because as gorgeous as it is in the summer winter is a world of pain.  After we dropped off our bags and Mr. Deep went for a run (good for him because I was not feeling so energetic after flying for 17 hours) we went to Starbucks. Of all the things to do in New York the first thing on our agenda was visiting Starbucks. 

I love Starbucks. If you aren't a fan you might wonder what is so great about it. We do have lovely coffee and numerous comfy places to drink it in Joburg. We even have places where you can sit with a laptop for hours and no will bother you. But there is something about Starbucks that is special. Their coffee is fine but it's definitely more the atmosphere that attracts me. That and the free wifi which is particularly useful as my South African SIM card doesn't work in the U.S. Starbucks is the answer to any question you could have...have time to kill, go to Starbucks, need to meet someone, go to Starbucks, feeling hungry, go to Starbucks, feeling tired, go to Starbucks, feeling bored, go to Starbucks, need to do work, go to Starbucks. You get the idea.

While we are on the subject of coffee I need to ask a question of my American readers. What is the deal with cold brew? I am seeing signs for it everywhere in America and while maybe I have heard of it before I am not quite sure what exactly it is. I am going to assume it's coffee served cold that somehow was brewed without ever having been hot. Like Coors Light. Wow, there is a major marketing push going on now for cold brew. And now I am feeling like I must try it even though I don't even know what it is. That's good American marketing.

This one is hand crafted

While many would describe the humidity in the northeast over the past week as oppressive I am thoroughly enjoying it. As I write this post the humidity where I am is listed at 71%. and it feels like heaven. Joburg is so dry and it's a struggle for me to stay properly hydrated. Yes, I know people live in shacks without proper services like water and electricity but for a moment we need to talk about my struggle with proper hydration. Even though I try to drink a good amount of water each day in Joburg my hydration is always a losing game. I wake up every morning feeling like a pile of dust. I can feel my skin aging rapidly and I am pretty sure that in the near future I am going to look like Georgia O'Keeffe minus the nice paintings. But with humidity, I can drink a few glasses of water a day and feel normal. I am not constantly parched with a headache and I'm not applying endless amounts of lotion. My skin is naturally plumping back up to normal levels and I believe I am now aging backwards. 

I am also noticing (and missing) the politeness of people in South Africa. In Joburg when you walk into a store you are greeted with "good morning ma'am" or "morning morning how are you ma'am?" The correct response to being asked how you are is good and you? which is pronounced "good and youuuuuuu?" Then, once these pleasantries are out of the way, you can proceed with your question or your business. 

In America people might also say good morning or ask how you are when you walk into a store but there is no one correct response. You can reply that you are good without inquiring back as how the other person is. People might also say hello or good morning in America and they might even ask how you are but then they might walk away before you can reply. I'm not saying people are rude here, I'm just saying our American way of greeting each other is totally different and much less involved kind of abrupt and not very genuine. It's not all that genuine in South Africa either as you're expected to reply "good and youuuu" and not to start listing your problems when asked how you are but I still like pleasantries and the way people in South Africa are careful to greet each other before getting down to business. I'm not saying people in the U.S. are rude. They aren't. It's just a different greeting process.

There was one gentleman who was rude to Mr. Deep. As we walked in New York a homeless man asked Mr. Deep for money. Because both Mr. Deep and I are so used to concerning ourselves with having spare change on us at all times so we can tip the never ending car guards who we come in contact with, Mr. Deep replied to the man "sorry I don't have any change." This response was not quite right. A better response might have been to say nothing, or to reply sorry I don't have any money. But Mr. Deep replied that he didn't have any change and the man took exception. He started yelling at Mr. Deep and continued to yell at him as Mr. Deep walked down the block. He yelled, "you don't have any change? What the F*** am I supposed to do with change motherf*****? This is New York F****** City! I don't need change. I need at least $20."

Welcome to the U.S.A.

Things that are Dumb

I am a pragmatic person. I like to do things in order and be as efficient as possible. When I have completed a task I prefer not to revisit it. That is why the potential of having to find a new house and move was bugging me so much. Finding a house had already been taken care of and now it was going to have to happen all over again? Didn't people understand that it was crossed it off the list? 

Fortunately, it seems like we are going to be able to stay in our house. We handled the situation in the way that we, as Americans, thought was best. We hired a lawyer.  Right after he got involved everything seemed to change and now it looks like we will be able to stay in this house with the same lease terms under the new owner/landlord. I won't truly believe it until the new lease has been signed (note, Mr. Deep insists we do not need to sign a new lease) but hopefully we dodged a bullet and moving remains off the things to do list.

The universe didn't want us to get too comfortable though because now the project that we have to do over is our visa applications. Yes, the entire visa application process that I wrote about in this post and this one has to be redone. The reason? Mr. Deep's office here in SA has changed it's name slightly and that requires us both to get new visas. 

And that is dumb.

If redoing the chest x-rays (we don't have TB) and the mounds of paperwork was not enough of a pain, it seems that I have a syndrome which makes my visa application even more challenging to complete.  I don't have readable fingerprints. An FBI background check is a requirement for the visa application and to get the background check you have to submit a set of inked fingerprints.

Every every time I get an inked set of fingerprints from the local police station and we submit them to the FBI they get rejected. We have submitted four separate sets of my fingerprints and they all have been rejected. Mr. Deep, who is apparently normal as far as fingerprints go, was approved on the first submission. Each of my rejection notices contain the following statement, 

"your fingerprints have been successfully received by the FBI, but are unable to be processed. There are a small percentage of individuals in which the fingerprint image quality is very low.   
An individual, by the nature of their work or age, may have very thin or worn ridges in the pattern area."

Work or age? Did I type so forcefully over the years at work that my fingerprints rubbed off? Or maybe it was dialing into all of those conference calls that did it? Did I do a lot of work where my hands were soaking in acid for hours on end and I just don't remember it? Did all of my nail biting somehow harm my finger tips? 

To the naked eye all appears normal

Which leads me to more things that are dumb. First, I have been in South Africa since shortly after my first FBI background check less than a year ago, so it would have been tough for me to commit a felony in the U.S. while living here. Second, it's dumb that we are still relying on ink fingerprinting (hey 1920 called and they want their technology back) when we have other methods such as electronic fingerprinting that could be used as common course of action. It's like when you go to vote and a 90 year old woman has to look in a book, IN A BOOK, to confirm if you are actually a registered voter. How have we not progressed past checking things in books and inking people's hands when we can send the Hubble or whatever that craft was called into space to send down photos of starlight that was generated 30 years ago? In proof-reading this post Mr. Deep says the starlight was generated more than 30 million years ago. OK, great, whatever that proves my point all the more.

Electronic scanning of fingerprints does exist. That is what I had to do the first time when we were still in the U.S., and my fingerprints were rejected and I first became aware of my print deficiency. At that time, a guy from an accredited company came to our house, hooked me up to a machine and scanned each fingerprint until it was legible and then submitted all of my prints to the FBI for approval.  Within 48 hours the background check was complete. So it can be done. But, the only companies that the FBI will accept scanned fingerprints from are located in the U.S. And that's - you guessed it - dumb! We did inquire to see if this prior set of scanned fingerprints could be used to conduct this latest background check but the fingerprint scans apparently are destroyed after they are submitted. 

So I have to make a trip to the U.S. on Monday. It's a 15 hour flight each way and I have to go by myself. It's going to cost Mr. Deep's company thousands of dollars in airfare and I do mean thousands because I'm going to sit in the very front of the plane if you know what I mean.  All this for a ten minute fingerprinting procedure. We are returning to the U.S. for Thanksgiving in less than two months but these fingerprints need to be done now. 

Of course it will be nice to be able to see my parents and a few of my friends. I should not complain about a free trip home (but I will anyway.) I wonder how many Starbucks coffees I sip down in the few days that I am back in the U.S.?  I can get a new iPhone while I am there since mine is old and looks like a brick. I can eat pizza by the slice every day and I can eat Mexican food. I can wander around Target aimlessly. When I talk people won't hear an accent. I will sound normal. When I order water can pronounce it wawdder instead of saying waw-teh. It will be fun.  But it's still dumb.