Time passes. Attitudes change.

I’ve now been living in London for well over a-year-and-a half but for some unaccountable reason I continue to affirm this time frame, even though I’ve well surpassed it. It rolls off my tongue in such a way that I predict I’ll be saying it when I’ve been living here a decade.  Just last week, when questioned by immigration officials, I replied “a-year-and-a-half” in much the same way that the malfunctioning mutant in Total Recall repeatedly replied ‘two weeks’ as its face melted.

Perhaps ex-pats find the year-and-a-half point pivotal. It’s the point at which your brain stops constantly recalibrating and questioning as to whether you’ve lost your marbles in the move. It’s when, if you’re lucky, you find you’ve made a handful of friends: like-minded souls you can depend upon, who’ll give you reason to laugh when things take a nosedive.  At a-year-and-a-half you stop […]