Parking: First of all, I am driving on the wrong, sorry - left, side of the road. Locating a parking spot is a challenge filled with multiple laps around the same block of two near my destination. Sometimes you have to just give up on finding a close location and shoot for a 5 minute walk (in the cold). Parallel parking has never been my strong suit and people in Scotland like to leave just barely enough room to make it work. I must admit my skills are improving and I can out park Ryan any day now. Then there is trying to figure out if one can park in an area at a certain day or time due to street cleaning, congestion routes and commuting times. There is rarely free parking except at the big box stores on the fringes or outside the city. So every-time I park it is a £1 charge - about $1.60 for anywhere from 30 - 60 minutes. Parking anywhere close to everyday stuff is just difficult. Signs are posted, but in small print, so I literally must get out of my car to read them - necessitating stopping and parking anyhow. Needless to say we have had 2 parking tickets in the 4 weeks we have been here. One we have protested out of ignorance and the other we simply paid - £30 ($50) ouch!
Bank Account: Before we arrived in Scotland, Ryan called to set up a bank account. This way, when we arrived we would have access to funds, etc. We were told that we would have to be in the country to establish a bank account. The day after we arrived amongst searching for housing and trying to simply get food, we visited a bank. We were told that we needed to get a permanent residence before we could have a bank. When we finally got our permanent place here (which we love), we again visited the bank. We were told that we actually need an official letter in the post from the utility or city council stating that this is actually our address. We had our utility email us a copy, but this still was not good enough. We then decided that we are doing this wrong, we visited another bank and they said because we are from the US and have a Visa, we can set one up immediately without residence verification. What!!!??? Well, 4 visits to the bank over 4 weeks meeting with personnel, too many ATM cash withdrawals to name and too many international transaction fees worth mentioning, we are proud owners of a bank account - the Bank of Scotland. Now we just have to figure out how to transfer funds without the same 4 visits to the bank and a month later...but we are waiting nonetheless for a debit card to arrive in the mail.
Doctor: I know many of you are not in favor of national health care in the US, but it is the system here in the UK. This has probably been the most painless experience of any. We showed up with applications for each of the kids, filled out a form in 10 minutes for all 7 of us, they made copies of our passports and visas and we are set. They do make appointments that have to be set up 7 days in advance and each day there are also a few hours for triage and quick visits if you simple drop by or call in. I hope we don't get sick while here, but at least we are feeling a bit more secure with having our doctor set up. Oh, and the office has no parking of course, but is about a 10 minute walk from our flat.
On a positive note, I do like to hang out at the canal with Owen, and feel pretty comfortable walking around the neighborhood to do errands. Ryan walks to work in the morning and home again at night. Most lunches he comes home as well. His work is literally one block away. The kids walk themselves to school, I pick them up at the end of the day, and hang out with Owen in between. Preston walks to and from his Secondary School and eats lunch with friends everyday at various cafes. Most lunches are fairly cheap and all his buddies know where to find the best deals around the school (think urban storefront, dense with 5 stories of residential on top in Georgian style flats). He is loving it especially everyone asking him to say their name in "American". He was a bit put out today that we made him walk to school in the rain - news flash...it rains here!
The highlight of the day was checking out a cooking school during Ryan's lunch hour. Edinburgh New Town Cookery School is calling my name. I hope to be able to give into its temptation.
Ryan for Lindsey
Owen the duck feeder on the Union Canal that goes through Edinburgh to Glasgow. The rowing crew at the private school is practicing in the background.
Sun setting in the afternoon on the canal. The days are getting very short.
We got a bank account!
So is your wonderful husband typing what you tell him? Is that the Ghost writer aspect? Lets hear it for getting a bank account!
ReplyDeleteRyan just wanted to type the update tonight, so he tried to write it from my perspective, Oddly romantic.
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