Getting to know you (again)!

Okay, so I've seen a couple of 'old timers' return to the forum in the last week or so, and we've loads of new members, of course.  Not everyone posts something on Welcome Wagon, and even if you do - sometimes the WW posts are pretty brief, not everyone reads them, so on & so forth.  I sometimes assume that most people already know me (well a lot of you do - lol!) but I just thought maybe it'd be nice to have a thread on Chit Chat, where we re-introduce ourselves, tell a bit about yourself, ask each other questions, etc.  Getting to know you again, as it were.

And I'm really hoping for a wide participation here from members - both new and old, as well as moderators too!

So yeah, to the extent of info that you feel comfortable revealing - who are you (remember this is the internet!  I'd avoid putting your email addie & things like that)?  Whereabouts are you living?  Where do you come from?  What do you want to tell us about yourself, your family, your interests/job/pets/pick-n-mix/etc?  What brought you to UKY?  Discuss! 

Okay, I'll go first...  

I'm Carolyn, and btw, Robinson is not my surname - that's just my online screen name.    I live in a lovely suburb of Leeds, West Yorkshire.  Originally, I am a native Kansan - where I spent 33+ years of my life, before moving to Tampa, Florida - I *loved* Tampa Bay and never thought I'd leave it.  October 12th (just past) marked 8 years since my English husband (Steve) first sent me an email through an online penpals website.  In January, it'll be 8 years from the time that we first met face to face.  He was 33 then and I was 38.  We dated over the course of year or so, then I moved over here and we got married in August 2004.

I didn't join the forum until early 2005.  (I didn't come here for visa advice - we just consulted the government website(s) for that, downloaded the forms and followed the directions.)  I came to UKY for the social interactions and because I was struggling to adjust to life in a new country - at the age of 40 years!  I am really grateful for having joined UKY because I have so many friends that I have met through it - I have been lucky to meet quite a few forum members over the years since I joined.  Even luckier that a few of you live relatively near to me as well & some of us have gotten to be good real-life friends as well, purely through the normal course that RL friendships develop.

Steve and I don't have any children or pets.  I have a job that bores & annoys the crap out of me, so I'll not spend time talking about that.  I am proud of my husband because he just celebrated 10 years with the same company (he is a software engineer).  We are quite close to his family here in England.  Both of my parents are deceased, but I feel quite close to my in-laws.  I still have two brothers living in the US, with their wives, as well as a niece and nephew.

We live to travel, and so you'll probably see me rambling on about our travels, from time to time.

What else do people want to know?

And now it's your turn!  

I'll bite:

I met my husband in 2001 on an internet gaming site.  I had given up on love, and definitely wasn't looking for a long distance thing (let alone an international LDR).  We talked for a few weeks and decided to meet in person after he finished his post graduate degree.  About six months later, we met in person, and a month and a half after that, we got married.  

After our plans for him staying in the US fell through, he returned to the UK to get a job and send for me.  He went to two advisers who gave him bad advice.  Because of this advice and his difficulty in finding a good job in his field, we spent about 6 years sorting everything out.  Finally, he got a good job and good advice, and we sent for and got my entry clearance.  If I had found UK-Y years before, I probably wouldn't have been in that situation, but we found a lot of sites that offered advice on immigrating to the UK (and EU immigration).  We just didn't find this one.

We did a QM2 crossing and our cat came over about 8 months later.  We lived in Pimlico with my inlaws and now have our own place in south London.

I participate in the London area book club, and I love books. I write, read, hang out in libraries, galleries, and I love history, design, and travel.  I try to garden but I am pretty pathetic at it because of my hatred of snails and slugs.  I like to cook, and I try to bake, but I am not all that good at baking.  Baking to me is like science, and I like the margin of error (or room for creativity) that cooking gives.

Other than that, I am hoping to apply for British citizenship in a few weeks. I love my life here, and although where my husband was from had no factor in my falling in love and marrying him, I think I was meant to live here.  I've sort of been a mild Anglo/Britophile all my life, but nothing overwhelming like some of the people who post here.  I had been to Europe before my move, but the first time I stepped foot in the UK was when I stepped off the ship at the beginning of my life here.

ETA: I forgot: I am from New York and New England.  I've lived in Scandinavia as well.

Would you believe I've been on UKY for nearly six years and I still haven't posted in Welcome Wagon! 

I was born in the UK, but have lived all over the world, including most of my adult life in the US, in Rhode Island. In 2003, I felt I needed a big change and was totally disillusioned with America (politics, lifestyle, attitudes, etc.), so decided to move back to the UK. I have loads of family here, so it wasn't as big a transition for me as it was for most UKYers. My cat and I arrived in June of 2003.

I settled in Pembrokeshire, where I was born and where all my family lives. But then I met my future husband in 2004 (online), and he lived in Cornwall. After doing the long-distance thing for five years, I eventually made the move down here. Although Cornwall is gorgeous, I miss Pembrokeshire and my friends every day!

We got married last year and now live in a little seaside village near St. Ives. Life is pretty good and I've finally made a good circle of friends here and have a busy social life. But I'd move back to Pembs in a heartbeat if we could!

Okey doke!  

I moved to Bath in 2006 to do an MA programme at Bath Spa Uni. I quit a very stable federal job, left my very stable life in Baltimore, packed up my cats, and headed over. I was 31 at the time and I moved over on my own. It was honestly one of the most challenging things I've ever done, but I'm all for experiences making you stronger! My family was/is really supportive of my move which is awesome. I found UKY before I moved. I think I was looking for advice, but I can't remember what I wanted to know! Most likely something about moving cats and finding a place to live. 

I ended up meeting my husband on eHarmony at the end of January 2007. He is Irish, but he was working in Sheffield at the time. In February 2007 we met up in Oxford for the first time. I was pretty fortunate to have a student railcard, so we saw each other quite a bit. In June 2007 he moved to Dublin for a new job, so we had a Ryannair relationship for almost 2 years. After I finished my course I stayed on my post-study visa and worked in Bristol. The job was boring, but my coworkers were lovely. That visa ended in February 2009 and we were married in April 2009. All told I lived in Bath for 2.5 years and I really liked it. DH and I said we'll move there when we become independently wealthy!  

So, I moved to Dublin in April 2009. I haven't been able to find a job since being here as the economy totally tanked right when I was moving over. I love being in Ireland (even though it has some serious problems), but I don't love living in Dublin. My husband's job contract is up at the end of December and there's nothing on the horizon for either of us. That coupled with the fact that after 4 years away I'm really missing my friends and family, we made the decision to head back to the US and we started the visa process for that in July. My inlaws are lovely, but I am definitely much closer to my family than he is to his. We'll head to the east coast where most of my family is located and we'll be able to get easy flights back to Ireland for visits.

On to the next adventure!

Yay for the brave, early participants!  What I think I'll do after we get some more folks posting is do a sort of index post - that can be updated & moved down to the end from time to time, with the person's screen name and a link back to their first introductory post on the thread.

Legs Akimbo, what do you like to cook or bake the most?  I like to do those things too, but I like it even more when DH does them & I just have the hard work of eating what he has made - lol!  

Chary - what about your all-star cat, Willie?!  I know you mentioned your cat, but he really is the bomb!  

Bmore_2_UK - I'm with you on 'experiences making you stronger'.  What do you think was the most challenging thing for you?  (Bmore_2_UK, as y'all probably know, is your friendly Healthcare & Insurance board moderator. )

Chary - what about your all-star cat, Willie?!  I know you mentioned your cat, but he really is the bomb!  

LOL. You don't have to twist my arm very hard to get me to talk about Willie the WonderCat! Although I think most people who've been around here a year or so probably know of him.

Willie came from Rhode Island with me in 2003. He's now 12, so he would have been 5 then. He'd been an indoor cat in Providence and was very overweight. Part of that was due to lack of exercise, but also he's a very 'big-boned' boy. He's really huge.

When I brought him to the vet in Pembrokeshire for his first check-up, they were appalled and we immediately put him on a weight loss plan. I had to take him in every three weeks to be weighed and measured, just like Kitty Weight Watchers. Not to turn this into an advert for Hill's, but he was on Hill's Prescription food and was following their weight loss programme.

Once his weight had got down (he ultimately went from 25 lbs to about 13-14 lbs) my vet suggested entering him in the Hill's Pet Slimmer competition. To our delight, he won the Welsh championship! There were all sorts of prizes, and we were in the local paper, on Radio Pembrokeshire, etc.

BUT THEN!!!!! Then he went on and won the prize for the whole UK! We were on BBC and ITV and were featured in news bits all over the place! There was even a bit in the NY Post which accused me of being anti-American and blaming his weight issues on the whole 'fat American' thing!

Here's his BBC feature.

I <3 Willie! 

Bmore_2_UK - I'm with you on 'experiences making you stronger'.  What do you think was the most challenging thing for you?  (Bmore_2_UK, as y'all probably know, is your friendly Healthcare & Insurance board moderator. )

Honestly, probably that first month when I was trying to get my internet/landline set up. I was really battling with homesickness at that point, I was by myself, and I had no way to contact any sort of support. It was really hard.

Honestly, probably that first month when I was trying to get my internet/landline set up. I was really battling with homesickness at that point, I was by myself, and I had no way to contact any sort of support. It was really hard. 

I often wonder if it would have been harder to move over here alone or not, but even there - we seem to see such a wide range of experiences, depending on the circumstances.

I never posted in Welcome Wagon either  .  I came to UKY for visa advice, and by the time I'd even noticed that WW existed, I had over a hundred posts, and it felt like the moment had passed.  So here's to making up for that, two years late!

I am one of the rare folk who didn't meet my husband online.  We met on an underground train in Osaka, Japan.  I had just gotten out of a very ugly relationship (no violence, just a lot of mind games and a broken heart--mine, not his) and had decided to take advantage of a job opportunity in Japan.  I had been there about two weeks when I met DH, and I remember thinking he was cute and funny, but I was still a bit overwhelmed by a strange new country and couldn't have been less interested in a relationship.  However a few weeks later, on Christmas Day 2006, actually, we found ourselves having a long conversation over dinner, and things took off from there.  We moved in together about six months later, into a lovely, lovely house in Osaka.  I still miss that house.  The following December we had to leave Japan because the company we were working for went bankrupt.  We both went back to our respective countries, but the following February I came to the UK to do a training course and try to find a job.  The course went well and I had some interest from employers but none of them were able to sponsor a visa, so I went back to the US and eventually got a job in Prague.  The idea was that DH would get a job there too (he was just temping in the UK) and we would live together there then move back to the UK with me on a UP visa.  DH had always told me that he didn't want to get married, and I wasn't too bothered about it myself, so that was the only way I could see for us to be together.  It didn't work out though because DH needed medical stuff in the UK, couldn't find a job in Prague, and then got offered a permanent postion with the NHS.  So in September 2008 he asked me to marry him.  I have never in my life been so gobsmacked.  I had given up on the idea of ever marrying, and to suddenly find myself engaged was surreal.  I hated my job in Prague, so we decided to marry asap and get me to the UK.  We were married in October 2008, and I moved to the UK in December.  We lived with his parents at first, and I was unemployed for the first six months, but we've now got our own flat and I have a job I love, and I'm about to apply for ILR!

I sometimes can't believe that I am where I am.  The three-ish years that preceded my moving to England were extremely hard, and I felt sort of lost and adrift, and like I was trying to force my life to be something that it wasn't.  These past two years, though, have been so good-- calm, happy, content, every positive adjective, really-- that I know I am in the right place and with the right man. 

I teach academic English as a foreign language (EAP), and I love it, even though it means a long commute and hard work for very little pay.  I am a word nerd and sometimes annoy people by correcting their grammar, punctuation, spelling or word choice.  I'm really not trying to be a PIA, but being very precise about language is my job, and sometimes I take my work home with me .  I speak fluent French, and this is the thing I'm most proud of because it is the only thing I ever really persevered in.  Normally, I tend to feel that if something is too hard then it's just a waste of energy  .  I like cooking, reading, travel, old films, long walks, baths, and have just recently started to enjoy baking.  I agree with Legs Akimbo that baking is really too precise for my taste-as-you-go style, but I am learning.

I was born in New Mexico, but grew up in Wisconsin and my family is originally from Iowa.  I lived in IA, NY, WV, and France, and most recently in CA before I moved to the UK.  WI and CA are the places in the US that feel most like home.  I have no plans to return to the US--pending the outcome of my ILR app, of course .  I love my family, but we have been living far apart for a long time now, and it works for us.  Plus my family love to visit me here.  They will be here just after Christmas and I am so excited!  There are things that I miss about the US of course, but I feel really at home in England and don't want to leave. 

Love this thread!

I joined the forum in January 2007 and actually came upon it completely by accident. I'm British, but I was researching the UK work visa process for a fiction story I was writing (one of my main characters was moving from the US to London by way of an intra-company transfer) and when I did a Google search for visa information, UK-Yankee came up. I mostly joined the site because I thought I might be able to help with questions that members had about life in the UK.

I do have a connection with the US though, in that my British aunt is a naturalised US citizen who has lived in the US for 32 years, I have 3 American cousins (adopted by my aunt) and also I have lived in the US myself as a student (a study abroad year in 2003/04 and I was a grad student there for several months in 2008). I felt that since I'd lived in both the US and UK and I was familiar with the cultural differences, I would be able to help out with questions that other members might have regarding differences between the US and the UK, especially between education systems as I'd studied at both UK and US universities.

At the time that I found and joined the forum I was also in the process of applying for PhD programs in the US, so I was going through the visa process the other way (UK to US). Over the years that I have been a member here, I've learned a lot about UK immigration and visas and I feel that I've gained a good understanding of the process, so I enjoying helping out new members with their visa queries.

In terms of my background, I'm 27 and am originally from Bristol, England. I attended Exeter University from 2001-2005 (with study abroad at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque in 2003/04) and got a degree in Theoretical Physics. Then I did a masters at Bristol in natural hazards (specialising in Seismology) and during that year I decided I wanted to return to UNM to study for a PhD in Geophysics (I moved back to the US in Jan 2008). However, I was really miserable there - I didn't enjoy my research project and found the grad student system too demanding there (too many classes, too much teaching as a TA and not enough time to research). I also realised that I didn't really want to live in the US anymore (despite it being my life-long dream to live there), so in August 2008, I made the really difficult decision to leave the PhD program and move home to the UK to get a job in a physics area. Unfortunately, the recession hit just after I moved and I got stuck working in my old vacation job in the pharmacy at Boots from August 2008 until October 2010. I finally managed to secure a graduate job a few weeks ago and as it stands now, I've just moved to Exeter and started the job 3 weeks ago... I'm training to be a weather forecaster with the Met Office (it's a very intensive 4-month training course, plus 4 months working as a forecaster at an RAF base to qualify, then a min. of 2 years working as a forecaster after that) .

(So if anyone has any questions about physics, over-the-counter medicines, and soon the weather (I'm not trained yet, so won't be too much help right now), I'll be happy to help )

I often wonder if it would have been harder to move over here alone or not, but even there - we seem to see such a wide range of experiences, depending on the circumstances.

I had a really hard time moving to the US on my own. The first time I lived there, it was only for 10 months and I moved with my best friend. I also made a few great friends there and I had an amazing time. The second time though, I was on my own, it was for a minimum of 4 years, I didn't enjoy being there and I didn't really manage to make any friends (there were only a couple of girls I was really starting to get on well with and one was about to move to Norway and the other was German and about to finish her PhD and move home to Germany). At the end of the day, I realised that I didn't really want to make the US my home... I belonged in the UK with my family and friends. Had I moved with someone or to be with someone (or had I really enjoyed my research), I probably wouldn't have had such as hard time and I might have stayed, but I was miserable there on my own and I felt like I was missing out on living my life in the UK.

I'll do a quick post now as I don't have a lot of time this morning, I can always elaborate later!

My real name is Andee (short for Andrea, but no-one calls me that) and I'm from Philadelphia.  After I got divorced about 5 years ago, I decided the time was perfect for a once in a lifetime adventure.  I left my job and apartment to go to Ireland for the summer.  My goal was to learn some new fiddle tunes and just see what happened!  I met my now hubby toward the end of that most magical and fantastic summer and we got engaged 9 months later and married in the UK 6 months after that.

Hubby also plays music so that's a really wonderful thing that we can share.  We perform together and go to open mic nights, plus I perform on Celtic harp on my own.  We hope to move to Ireland in the future. 

Hubby teaches conservation and countryside management so being outdoors is something he loves.  I like connecting with nature, too but sometimes find hiking and camping a bit out of my comfort zone, but hubby has learned to be more patient with me since I can't go as fast as he can.

I'm vegetarian, hubby isn't but he loves my veggie cooking which is good.  We're both in our 40s, I'm a bit older than he is.  No kids, no pets except fish, and of course our neighbor's cat Dylan comes to hang with us often.

We live in Leeds, very close to Mrs. Robinson, mapleleafgirl, and sarahjoyhappy.  I work in a charity shop (for now) which is very hard and physical work.  My favorite part of the job is doing the window and seeing everything first and putting stuff aside for myself!  Back in the US I worked at a natural food market (sort of like Whole Foods) which I really miss for many reasons.

I love traveling but we can't afford it at the moment!  I really want to get back to Cornwall (I've had many visits there before I met hubby) to see my beloved ancient sites and stone circles, so hopefully soon.

That's all I can think of at the moment!

Like Historyenne I never did a WW post either  So I guess I'll try to make up for that now.

I first came to UKY not looking for visa advice <gasp!> but being a new parent in a country where I had no family but my husband...I needed a place to ask questions & get a little emotional support.

I met my husband via YouTube in January 2007. I was living in Oakland, CA where I had moved to in 2006 from a little town near Redding, CA where I lived for about 31 years. I posted a random comment on a video he had made and it went from there. We became good friends and when things went south back in the states he offered to let me stay with him till things calmed down back home. So I left my cushy government job that paid well and I could do in my sleep, packed up all my belongings and made a run for it in August 2007 on a visitor visa for 6 months to kind of 'hide out' and heal from a really bad relationship that had ended badly and an ex that wouldn't go away.

One thing lead to another and we decided that we were more than friends and I began researching how I could come back to the UK, work visas were out because I really didn't have the qualifications required to do the job in the UK that I did in the US...so the only option we had was marriage. So when I returned to the US in Feb 2008 he came with me and we were married. I stayed in the US for 6 weeks and returned in March 2008 on a spouse visa...we welcomed our daughter in May 2008 (6 weeks early) and I struggled with being unemployed, a new mom, PND, no family except my husband and exhaustion.

In September 2008 I found UKY & it became the place where I could interact with others and slowly I started sharing my visa experience as I had done massive amounts of research on the official websites and had a pretty good understanding of the rules & process before I did my own visa.

Last year I really began to dive into the immigration world and am really enjoying being on the forefront of information that I receive and then can share with the community.

We've been back to the US twice since the birth of our daughter and we quickly realised how important family is (since we don't have any here) and made the decision that once I received my ILR this past April that we would start the process to move back to the US. So we filed the petition for my husbands visa in June this year which was approved last month and we are waiting for my parents to complete the sponsor paperwork so we can go ahead with the visa application.

Since we decided to go back to the US life here has been on hold, saving our pennies, putting off moving into a larger place that we desperately need (we live in a 1 bed flat that was my husbands for years before I moved here), not fixing the rattling sound in our car that we're going to get rid of soon anyway and loads of other things...life for me has been in a holding pattern and I can't wait to get back to the US and start living again...Back in my old house, back to my old job and back to my wonderful family.

So just over 3 years of being here we're on the road to go back, but we're also leaving the door open for our return (because you never know) so I'll be applying for Naturalisation in 2 weeks. But we hope to be back in the US in late January early February...until then I'm here, probably more than I should be sometimes, but I have nothing bad to say about the UK , I love it here but it's very lonely for all of us and our future lies elsewhere.

I'm pretty sure I did a WW post way back in 2003 when I joined. Actually, if I recall correctly, I had joined even earlier than 2003 as I already had an active account when I 'found' the site again, but I have no recollection of signing up!

I moved to Reading, UK in September of 2000 to do an MA/PhD in graphic communication (history/theory). I lived in the dorms, even though I was 30, but had chosen the dorm for 'mature' students. Within a few weeks, I'd met all of my flatmates (8 rooms with a shared kitchen), one of whom I ultimately married in October of 2004. He was British and we spent 2001-2004 moving around various parts of the country while he pursued work and I attempted to stay on top of my PhD. He was then accepted to do a fully funded PhD at Exeter Uni and we remained in the south west until 2008. While we both worked on our PhDs, we both held down part time jobs and I had 2 children. My 2 boys and I are all dual citizens.

Shortly after my second son was born and my husband was in the final stages of his PhD, he received news he'd been chosen for a post-doc at the Smithsonian. Not only was this exciting for him professionally, but it was going to put us back in the area I was originally from (Baltimore/DC).

So we packed up what we wanted to keep, sold the rest, and moved in with his parents in Cumbria while he finished writing up.

I moved back with the boys 2 years ago this month. He followed in March of 2009.

Unfortunately, our relationship, which was already under the strain of years of financial stress, cracked under the weight of medical problems (both mine and my son's), the poor job market here, and my huband's inability to deal with all the changes in his life.

We've been separated for a year now and I am moving forward. I've just managed to get a job teaching after 2 years of trying so things are looking up though I've yet to finish my own PhD.

I still miss aspects of England terribly, but I am grateful to have my family and I have re-connected with old friends here.

I know this sounds slightly crazy, but as a child I always knew I'd be with someone from another country. There's a part of me that still believes that, so maybe I just got the wrong guy the first time around!

But that's neither here nor there. For now, we are more or less settled in the US and I'm well past trying to figure out what the future will bring.