Pinay Expat (Sort Of) Meets Ian McEwan

Writer Catherine Batac Walder, who is based in Europe, gave me permission to share her email on this blog. Let's see into the mind of this Pinay expat writer, who is generous enough to share her experiences:

March had a sad start. As some of you know an aunt of mine, my
mother’s oldest sister, one who had lived in the same house and had
seen all of us grow up, died. Mike suggested for us to come to the
Philippines, but I didn’t want to go back (yet) after almost four
years on such a sad occasion. I felt so lonely I just wrote and wrote
for days that I managed to finish a story about her...

***

I was back to Oxford University two weeks ago – almost a year since
that unforgettable job interview at the Faculty of English Language
and Literature which I had attended just for the experience of it (I’d
already accepted the job at Royal Holloway when I got the invitation).
I had checked out the profile pages of my panel afterwards, and had
found this page about the chairperson that if I’d known earlier who
she was I probably would have been nervous during the interview (but
she had been extremely nice we’d ended up talking about literature
even when the job I had been applying for was not related). The page
I had found said of her “Effectively, head of the largest English
department in the UK.”

Anyway, Mike and I went to Oxford for an Ian McEwan affair. He was to
receive an award for Literary Excellence. Afterwards he was also
interviewed by Peter Kemp. The whole thing was part of a big event,
the annual Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival. I had an MP3 player
in my bag and I regret I didn’t record the interview. It was both
enjoyable and inspiring. I was surprised listening, and later reading
some more, about Ian McEwan’s background. Having been born into a
not-so well-off family I could relate to his struggles. But I
wouldn’t have been that surprised if I had met someone with a past
like his while I was living in Quiapo, not Berkshire.

I wasn't surprised when he mentioned L.P. Hartley's “The Go-Between”
as one of his early writing influences. There are similarities
between that novel and “Atonement.” I asked Mike what he thought of
Ian McEwan. He said, “he looks very content and happy to talk about
his stuff.” He is probably one of those really pleasant famous people
I’ll ever meet. Well, we didn’t quite meet. There were over three
hundred people who went to the affair, with half waiting for their
books to be signed afterwards. There were lots of press people, all
cameras ready, clicking as he signed every book. I wanted a photo
with him but I didn’t know how Mike could get past those press people.
What he did was he stayed in the queue and I went up to Ian and after
he signed asked him if I could please have a picture with him. He
might have said, “of course,” (I couldn’t remember) but as you’ll see
in the photo on multiply, he looks so nice and pleasant, this man.
Mike was laughing at me, joking I’d be in the papers as, of the
hundreds who asked for Ian’s autograph, I was the only one who
bothered to look at the cameras :-)

In May in London, Kazuo Ishiguro will talk about his new book. He is
one of my favourite contemporary novelists, even more than Ian McEwan.
I’d really love to meet him but he seems a bit reclusive so I’m still
debating on whether I’ll go to the talk or not.

***

Edyta, a post-doc in our group, got back from Australia last week
after three weeks of visiting petroleum companies in Sydney,
Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. But her main destination was
Geoscience Australia (GA) in Canberra to talk about a collaboration
between GA and our group.

Anyway, when she got back there was a koala bear toy (with a baby –
what d’ya call them?) on my desk. It wasn’t just that. Its tag was a
tiny passport, and, it had an immigration stamp on it! You might
remember the story of my bear traveller that has a passport and how,
during a recent trip to Belgium, I asked the officer at the French
border to stamp the passport for me. Edyta laughed, saying, “I did
it. Because I know you collect them.” She told me how the
immigration officer asked her, “oh, so you’re a geoscientist. What
did you do here?” She said she gave some talks, blah blah and while
the officer was stamping her passport, she took out the koala from her
bag, and asked the officer if he could stamp it.

He looked suspiciously at her, saying, “so you’re a geoscientist...”

She laughed and said, “it’s for my friend.”

That was really sweet of her.

I’ve got other koala soft toys (a Steiff from Mike that I named Kozlo,
then there’s the koala tissue box, and another one I gave to Father
Gallagher more than a decade ago) but Edyta’s gesture was really
something else. Look her up in the Royal Holloway photos, the
beautiful Polish girl with her eyes closed, enjoying the sun. That
time when we stood outside for a coffee (chocolate milk for me) break
in one of those rare days when it wasn’t raining in England. I’m
exaggerating, of course.


***

Theatre. So far our goal of watching one show every month is
happening. Last month we saw “Vincent in Brixton” which is about Van
Gogh’s three years living in London. Mere speculations really, how he
descended into madness. I have the book on which the play was based
but never got to read it, consisting of Vincent’s letters to his
brother Theo. I miss my library back in the Philippines... I liked
the artistic (literally) way the play ended. It was quiet, not a lot
of props were used and it was set in a real working kitchen. We were
sat in front, a chance to have eye-contact with the performers. You
feel as though they are talking to you / performing for you alone. I
guess it’s why I like watching reruns of Twilight Zone, those days
when even television was like theater with minor special effects, lots
of meaningful dialogue and brilliant performances. The play was
staged in Haymarket in Basingstoke, therefore, the tickets were very
cheap as compared to ones for shows in the West End. I liked the
theatre there, very new and Mike was quite happy that there was a lot
of leg room, unlike the theatres in London where everyone’s almost
huddled together. We don’t have anything yet scheduled for this month
(would like to see a suspense-thriller on stage next week). We have
booked for Ben Hur Live! in September as I was curious how they would
do the chariot scene, and also just received our tickets for Samuel
Beckett’s Waiting for Godot for next month. Godot stars Ian McKellen
and Patrick Stewart in this play I’ve wanted to see since college.

***

The test I studied for, and luckily passed only this afternoon (thank
God) after the first try, is the Life in the UK test. I need it when
applying for a permanent residence, and eventually, getting a British
passport. I have till October to take the test but wanting to get it
out of my system, I booked it even before I started studying. I
treated it like a story submission – I knew I wouldn’t start doing
anything till I have a deadline. So I booked almost a month ago then
started reviewing.

To be fair the test is not out to get you, it’s really there to help
you learn more about the UK, and what’s good about it is you also get
to know your benefits. Before I entered the testing centre Mike told
me not to put too much emphasis on it (if I fail). He added that of
course it’d be nice to pass it the first time but anyway I have a lot
of time to take it again (but what, pay 34 quid each time?). I knew
that I would be frustrated if I failed as I really studied hard. I
read the book, then read it the second time and took down some notes.
It must be this getting old syndrome, I find myself having difficulty
memorising so I read the chapters I had to study aloud and made a
voice recording. I listened to my mp3s on the train to work and back,
also listened when I was ironing (I used to have piles of clothes to
iron, now the wardrobe’s all organised and tidy after hours of
listening to the recordings while ironing). I also have this practice
book that has some 800 questions in it. I worked on the questions in
the book twice, till I gave up because there were so many mistakes in
the answer sheets. The hubby sat outside in the car for over an hour
and managed to read an issue of Top Gear magazine from cover to cover
while I took the test.

I guess the next thing I should do is to contact the Philippine
Embassy in London to ask about dual citizenships, as like most expats
I’m hoping to retire in the Philippines.

Thanks for sharing, Catherine!