It’s all Double-Dutch to me

Amanda will occasionally tease me by “cursing” me in Chinese. This I accept.
But this evening, in the kitchen, she muttered something that I didn’t understand and when I asked her what she had said her reply was “Oh, it’s ok… Not even Mandarin speakers would have understood that. It was in my local dialect.”
What ?!
My few words of Mandarin, (my name, “Nihao”, and about five items of food), don’t stand a chance of helping me to understand her when she’s blabbering in Mandarin, but now I’m expected not to understand her in some strange dialect too !
That woman expects too much of me. 😦

Do my delicate bits have “Kick Me” written all over them ?

Image via Wikipedia

There goes life again, patiently waiting in the shadows to leap out and kick me right where it hurts.

Amanda moved over here last Friday; I’m “back to the wall” financially at the moment after spending out on her visa (UK Government rip-off), and all the flights, and having just come back from two weeks holiday; we are struggling to find work for her; and then what happens ?

Today we were all laid off at work as the company folded.

Great ! Yippee-dabby-doobie !

I might as well go to a tattooist, drop my pants, spread my legs, and tell him to start writing “Kick Me” all over whatever he finds there.

The company can’t afford to pay us any redundancy money, so there will be about a six week wait for the Government scheme to come up with anything, and that won’t be much.

Amanda is taking it very well at the moment, but with no sign of any income at all for the next few weeks and only enough dosh available to cover food for the next two weeks (no bills, just food), it looks like things are going to get a little tough.

Thanks a bunch, Life, I love you too !

Update: 23 Sep 09:00

Forgot to mention:

Yesterday I got a call from Amanda saying that a light bulb in the living room had exploded and tripped the main fuse so I had to go home to reset things for her, then last night my printer went kaput just as I needed to print out some very important paperwork (and now I won’t have access to an office printer either).

Now this morning I went to pull the kitchen window closed and the hook came off in my hands, spilling the attachments over an inaccessible part of the roof downstairs just as the kettle developed a leak and will (desperately) need replacing.

Keep kicking !

Amanda and Mary Poppins are the same person

Do you remember Mary Poppins ?

Do you remember the plethora of weird things that she pulled out of her Salisbury travel bag ?

Having seen what Amanda managed to produce from the suitcases when she was unpacking the other day I think she must be Mary Poppins in disguise.

Yes, given that this was Amanda’s “moving” trip and I had to book an extra case on the flight I knew there would be endless amounts of clothes and quite a few more pairs of shoes, but the list of other items was quite impressive…

Webcam & Mic
Rice cooker
Spoons/scoops for attaching to outside of rice cooker
Spare bowl for rice cooker
DVDs of Nanning Folk Festival
2 Electric adaptors and 2 extension leads
1kg Chicken Powder Seasoning
Set of place mats and Coasters
Upright chrome drying rack for kitchen, designed for holding chopping boards, knives and chopsticks
Chinese New Year door decoration
Dried salty fish (very smelly, but very well wrapped)
Dried Longan berries
Pork Floss 200g
Pack of dried mini-shrimp
Preserved eggs (pack of 8 )
Duck wing (1)
Chinese bacon
Chinese sausages (4 packs)
1 vacu-packed pillow
Water melon seeds (large pack)
More sausages
2 boxes of soft-grip gel ink pens
Sauce for hot bean curd (6 packs)
Some liquid for helping with the cooking (clear alcohol of some sort)
A shoebox full of assorted (Chinese) medicines
59 moisturising face masks
2 new pairs of shoes for wearing with her Qipao’s (very smart)
1 gold handbag, one blue double wallet, same purpose as shoes
A plastic mini heat-preserving lunch box with sections for soup, rice and main dish
Moon Cakes (seemingly hundreds of)
Another pack of CDs/DVDs in a travel holder

Somehow we’ve managed to find homes for it all, but it’s really emphasised the need to move to somewhere bigger. 😦

What’s the first question a new resident in the UK asks ?

Arrived home with Amanda at about lunchtime yesterday.  🙂

As we started to look around the place at all the suitcases and bags that needed unpacking (!) I spotted a police van and car pulling away from one on the blocks in the cul-de-sac opposite and I mentioned to Amanda that I thought some “undesirables” must have moved in over there some time back because I had seen the police there in numbers on a quite a few occasions over the past couple of months.

A. “Do I need to register with the police ?”

T. “Why ?”

A. “Don’t the police need to know there’s a foreigner living here now ?”

T. “No, darling… Not in this country.”

Thanks, Kelly, for reminding me of that.

The long wait and the worrying is over

It’s taken many months and has been a long and stressful wait, but at last…
Amanda has got her Spousal Visa ! 😀 😀
It finally came through, although the last two days since she knew that the answer was on its way has been horrendous.
If she had been refused I don’t know what we would have done.
So now all we have to do is find the money for the flights for me to go out to collect her and bring her “home”.
Hopefully she will be here by the middle of September.
I can’t wait.
I’m going down the list of names in my phone, calling and texting everybody.
What a relief !

“Auld Lang Syne” is not Chinese !

Nor, for that matter, is “Herge’s Adventures of Tin-Tin”.

These little nuggets of information may not appear earth-shattering to you, but they did come as quite a surprise to Amanda.

“How ?”, you might ask…

“Look at your wife” (2) … The official wedding pictures

Well Amanda had a good day on Thursday… not only did the Official Wedding Photos arrive, but she got her new visa too. Yes, A full 2 year, multiple entry visa which gives her the freedom to come and go as she pleases. 🙂

Anyway, now you can see why I was so starry-eyed that day 🙂 ….

My beautiful Amanda with her new husband

My beautiful little wife

Hello you ! .... Kiss ?

This is Amanda's favourite picture

Words fail me

Beautiful and happy

All pictures copyright A&TH

More wedding pics

Okay, so here are some more pictures of us on, or around, our wedding day.

The two of us at an office dinner	Getting ready to go in	Getting the paperwork done
Saluting the flag	Yes, Mr & Mrs !	Double Happy - Job done

The official photographers have said that they will need around 50 days to get the proper pictures ready.

I dread to think how much “air-brushing” they need to do of me …

“Look at your wife.”

Nervous moments

Double-checking

It's time for the rings

The photographer spoke in a monotone voice the whole time, and yet with a certainty that was apparent even though I could not understand a word that he said, except on the occasional times when he broke into his limited English. 

 

As the sessions continued I became more used to what was required of me, and gradually his utterances of “Sir” and a hand gesture became easier to understand.  He smiled and said “Oh yes!” more often.

 

All the while his assistant busied himself with the task of positioning us, our hands and our clothes. His favourite expression seemed to be “Okay, Sir, take a break” whenever my involvement in a sitting was complete.

 

Sometimes there was a degree of confusion but, on the whole, things went fairly smoothly. 

 

Amanda acted as translator for us, passing on the instructions from the pair of them, and the instruction I enjoyed hearing from her the most was “Look at your wife”.

 

 

I looked at the beautiful face so close to mine. 

 

I looked into the eyes of my Amanda who was radiant as I had never seen her before.

 

 

She was happy, delighted, and delightful. 

 

I looked into the eyes of my beautiful Amanda and wondered how life could ever be better than this.

 

Amanda in her 'Wedding Dress'

Definitions of Marriage

(or… Things That Make Me Laugh (7) )