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Sunday, March 31, 2013

Vivat Regina


I have a confession to make. From the ages of 8 until 12, a time when many of you were gazing lovingly at your Beatles, David Cassidy, Duran Duran, or Backstreet Boys album covers, I was harbouring a deep, dark secret. No, it wasn’t a misguided crush on Boy George. In fact, I cared very little for the boy bands of my time. I was too busy cutting out pictures for my scrapbook and pouring over books featuring my REAL interest: The British Royal Family.

Yes, it’s true. I was a staunch 10 year old mini- monarchist. I would have worn kid gloves and a tiara to school if my mother had let me.  By the time I went to middle school I could rattle off the birth dates and full names of most of the principal members of the royal family, the schools they went to and the names of their polo ponies. I knew what they liked to do in their free time (polo and skiing) and the intricacies of their social circles (polo team players and managers). The wedding of Prince Charles and Princess Diana on 29th July 1981 in St Paul’s Cathedral (see what I mean?) intensified my interest, but I was hooked long before that. I blame it primarily on my grandmother, a devoted anglophile and devout monarchist.  When I stayed with her and my grandfather in their tiny D.I.Y Tudor-style cottage, my bed time stories were from books with catchy titles like, “The Six Wives of Henry VIII in Excruciating Detail” and “Debrett’s Peerage and Baronetage for Insomniacs”.  For me, this was compelling stuff. Certainly not average reading material for a pre-teen girl, but there you have it. I was an odd child.

As a consequence of this early indoctrination, I dreamed of having a life surrounded by the people in these books. They were my fairy stories, only they involved people and places that really and truly existed. By the time I was 11 my imagination had me married off to Prince Edward, the youngest son of the queen. Never mind that I hadn’t yet even been to England and I was the daughter of a grocer, living in a town the size of a postage stamp in rural Canada. My parents cared passionately about good manners and social graces and endeavored to prepare me for whatever situation might come my way. I have always thought myself lucky that they did.

When I was 27 I moved to the UK, and briefly married a British diplomat. During those few years, I became a part of the world I had only dreamt about. Garden parties in Kensington, balls and receptions at Whitehall Palace, dinner conversations with people called “Sir” and “Lady”. Frankly, I faked my way through most of it by pretending to be Princess Diana. Most of the time, I felt accepted. And it was wondrous. I had unexpectedly become a part of the world I had always dreamed of and had, until that time, only really existed in my childhood scrapbook.

It all came crashing down when my husband and I divorced. That world had always seemed too good to be true, and now it was gone. But the little girl inside me wasn't able to let it go.  Not entirely. For the next few years, I continued to visit the UK . I felt the need to return to what I knew and the places that brought me such childlike comfort. The people and places in my scrapbook were so much more real to me now, and I could still see and touch them, even though I was once again on the outside looking in.

On one of those flights to London last fall, I was seated next to an English gentleman and we struck up a lively conversation. I was on my way to the UK to spend time with Scottish partner, he was on his way home to Wiltshire after a conference in Toronto. He was older than me, a great conversationalist with amusing stories to tell. He told me about his wife and sons, his career in the military, the time he spent in India. We each had a couple of those lovely mini-bottles of wine, our rectangular beef or chicken frozen dinners, and a good old chat as we crossed the Atlantic. By the time we reached Heathrow and started the race to immigration, we were fast friends. As we parted ways, he handed me his card and I tried not to smile as I saw the insignia.

“Any time you and your partner are in London and you want to come see me at the House of Lords, just drop me an e-mail. I would be glad to give you a personal tour,” he said as we waved good bye.
I stood and stared at the name on the card, just for a moment. And then, right there in the middle of passport control at Heathrow, I did a little dance, before calmly placing his card in my wallet and continuing on my way. I still had another flight to catch. And possibly a scrapbook to update.


(Stay tuned folks, for the story of me attempting to keep my cool on a private tour of the House of Lords.)

Friday, March 22, 2013

Ya Gotta Kiss A Lot of Frogs


Making friends is never easy, we all know that. I am sorry to say it gets harder as you get older. As time goes on your standards change and it’s no longer simply about whether the girl next to you also likes pink, or can consistently colour inside the lines or wants to join the Michael Jackson fan club that you are currently running out of your parents’ garage. You become picky and start looking for complex, intangible things like integrity, values and the ever elusive ‘good sense of humour’.  Although most of us will naturally gravitate towards those with talents, likes or dislikes similar to our own, the criteria for friendship naturally broadens a bit as time goes on. But just between you and me, I will confess to a continuing fondness for those who know all the lyrics to “Thriller” by heart. Bonus points if you include the Vincent Price bit.

Moving to Stavanger and facing the prospect of making new friends at age 40 was, and sometimes still is, a daunting prospect. While it is true that I don’t generally have problems meeting people and inflicting my friendship upon them, in the back of mind I always have a fear that THIS time will be different. This time I won’t meet anyone I like, or worse, no one will like me. I become 16 all over again, full of all the angst and anxiety but with a few less pimples and way more wrinkles. It doesn’t seem to matter that I have been doing this expat thing for the better part of 12 years, and that this is at least the seventh time in my adult life that I have had to start all over again in the friendship department. In my head I am still somewhat convinced that there are a finite amount of friendships to go around and that I have to get in there quickly and impress someone or I am never going to get invited to the prom. Instead, I will be left standing by the gym wall swaying back and forth to some Celine Dion song while everyone else gazes lovingly into their partner’s eyes.

It all sounds so frantic and slightly desperate, doesn’t it? That’s because it is. It’s like blind dating for months on end. Frantic, slightly desperate AND exhausting.

In all the cities I have lived in, there has always been an expat circuit, and Stavanger is no exception. If you are the temporarily jobless, accompanying partner, you have to do the rounds. The events organized for us are often similar to going on a cruise or package holiday except that sadly there is no free nightly Viking musical show and the drinks are reaaaalllly expensive. The purpose of this circuit is to create a sense of community among the community-less, and for the most part they achieve that aim.  Pub quizzes, coffee mornings, mum’s groups, they are all about trying to get us to meet as many people as possible rather than throw our hands up in the air and admit social defeat.

If you are lucky, you meet your friendship soul mate in the first few weeks of this circuit, after which you can just sit back and watch all the other poor souls drift aimlessly about, clutching their expensive drink while the love theme from Titanic plays wistfully in the background. If you are unfortunate, or have special friendship needs, you could be hanging about for months waiting for that certain someone to come along.

But we must not lose heart. The flip side of this whole situation is that we are in a town full of comings and goings. Yes, it can be heart-wrenching when your new found BFF suddenly decides that they are moving to Azerbaijan or Alaska, but if someone is leaving, someone else is just arriving. And you can bet your bottom Kroner that they will be looking for friends, too. It’s like having an eternal, self-replenishing dating pool at your fingertips. Even New York can’t claim that.

Despite our individual needs and relatively small numbers, there is a diverse and social expat community here. Stavanger may not have the non-stop excitement of a Bangkok or London, but there are always new people to meet if you are willing to make the effort. As for my new-found friendships, well, I suppose I can modify my criteria on the Michael Jackson thing a little. As long as you don’t listen to Celine Dion. That, my friend, is out of the question.

So, can I buy you a drink?