I have a Green Card!
Actually, it’s green and white and blue, and is properly called a GNIB (Garda National Immigration Bureau) Card. In all honesty, it looks a lot like the fake ID I carried never considered possessing in high school: thick and blocky with a fuzzy photo that makes me look like a combo of my father (who is almost 70 and has a beard) and Lucy Liu. I love it. The card. Not the photo.
Getting my GNIB Card means I can stay in Ireland for at least the next year, and involved sitting for what felt like an aeon in a large, slightly grotty room with butt-numbing plastic chairs, fifteen service windows–of which only a couple were being staffed at any given time, and about a hundred people speaking a dozen different languages. It could have been any DMV office in a big American city.
I was fortunate. Other than the wait, it went pretty quickly and smoothly for me. My husband is a native Dubliner. We’ve been married for ages and have all the right paperwork. We handed over passports, marriage certificate, and the bill for Madam’s current school (why? well, first because it had my name and our local address on it, and second because it is generally accepted that anyone paying any sort of private school tuition here must be truly determined to live here). The very nice man behind the glass took my picture and fingerprints, told me about his sister in Connecticut who’s ready to come back after years away, handed me my card, and welcomed me to the country. Easy peasy.
But before my turn at the window, I had a lot of time to study what was going on around me. I have lived most of my life in big American cities. I’ve spent a fair amount of time at the DMV. There was nothing unfamiliar about the people around me (although the five plaid-and-pleather-clad, colorfully-coiffed guys who just had to be a Moldovan boy band were extra fun to watch). A Haitian man was arguing with his friend about the merits of the Irish national soccer team. Or they might have been discussing “Eastenders”; the accoustics were terrible and my French ain’t what it used to be. University students from all four corners were doing terrible things to the noise level but greatly improving the atmosphere with their cheeriness. The other Americans looked grumpy and entitled. Just another bureacratic circus. Except for the first time, I was foreign along with everyone around me, which I found kinda awesome–and for the first time it occurred to me how much harder just about everyone there probably had to work to get to that room. That was kinda humbling.
Here’s how it worked for us, abridged version: A year ago, we decided to move to Ireland for some amount of time between a year and forever. Just seemed like a good idea. Himself wanted to spend time with his family; I’ve been wanting to do this for years. The kids agreed that Ireland sounded cool. We sold our Philadelphia house. We packed, said goodbye to our friends and my family–knowing we could see them just about any time we wanted since just about every single one of them has Skype, Google+ and/or FaceTime. We got onto an Aer Lingus plane at JFK and off it six hours later in Dublin. Himself’s parents had already found us a place to live–and happily put us up until it was ready. We bought Himself Jr and Madam uniforms and hockey sticks and piles of books and dropped them off on the first day of the school year in our first choice schools. Now, after they go to school (where the language is familiar, the kids also have names like Himself Jr and Madam, and the teachers are predictably fab or mockery-inducing), I mainline some more coffee, plug in my laptop, and go to work (or Polyvore.com) just like I have for years, often in fuzzy slippers and yoga togs.
It was, unavoidable sucky parts of moving aside, an absolute piece of cake. Our respective governments like each other. There’s no language barrier. And while my in-laws (understandably) can’t make heads-or-tails of Thanksgiving, they don’t think less of me for it. We came because we wanted to and can go back any time we want to. Believe me: I knowexactly how lucky I am that I can do this.
So, while my butt went numb in the GNIB chairs, I listened to people being called up over the loudspeaker: “National of…China, Egypt, Phillippines, Burkina Faso, Pakistan…”, watched them grin and dance and hug and tuck their GNIB cards away with enormous care. One older woman wrapped hers in spangled silk before putting it in her bag. I figured the quiet Congolese couple in seriously battered shoes had a story. Maybe not. Sure…Maybe they decided to leave a contented, comfy life there because it seemed like a nice change, a little adventure, coming to Ireland. Y’think? I know the Malaysian man ahead of me in line had a story. Don’t know what it is, but I know when he asked me for a pen and thanked me upon returning it, he spoke slowly and with immense care, correcting himself several times, and he cried when he got his card.
I had to look up Burkina Faso on my iPhone (lousy connection in that GNIB building…how’s that for a First World problem?) and was grateful for spell-check. I realized I can only guess at how many countries are part of the EU. Embarrassingly, I still can’t reliably identify much between Vietnam and Australia. Maybe I shouldn’t feel too badly; I remember hearing that more than a third of Americans can’t find the US on a map. But there isn’t a doubt in my mind that every single adult in that GNIB room could find Ireland. And the US.
How did this segue into a soapbox about American ignorance and arrogance? Well, um, it’s me. Soapbox queen. Soapbox queen with a Green(ish) Card. I have to go back in a year and check in. I plan on working on my map skills during that time.
In the meantime, on a less soapy note… I’ve received more comments about my September 15th photo than any other. Like, lots. And no, not about the key that I was photographing, but about one of my rings. Yes, it is a spine. Yes, I wear it as a wedding/eternity band. Yes, I will tell you where to get one. Ayaka Nishi. I have one of her rib cuffs, too. Love her stuff. Ick, you say? Fine. Go read a blog about kittens.
Finally, tune in this week for my first contest-from-afar. I’m going to post a pic with nuthin’ attached. Whoever gives it the best caption wins something small and light (for shipping) and strange (because it’s me doing the shipping). Like a sock. Well, no. It won’t be a sock. Something small and strange and Irish.