Expat Friendships For Children

It is often said that expat friendships are fast and furious, they are intense in post but once one or other of you moves away the friendship starts to wane.  I keep in contact with some friends over Facebook and comment on their photos but we both know that we are only in touch because it is convenient these days.  We won’t go out of our way to meet up again  (though we would happily share a coffee if we ran into each other).  The bond we have was limited to a certain place and time. Other expat friends have become real friends – I write to a number of people quite regularly, long emails about life, the universe and everything and we go out of our way to meet up.  Just before Christmas I took a 200 mile diversion on my drive from my parents’ house to my in laws to stay a night with a couple we knew in Astana.  It was wonderful to catch up.  Similarly a few years ago Mr EE and I found ourselves in Hong Kong at rather short notice and a friend dropped all her plans to meet us for lunch.  That same year we organised our summer holiday to Turkey instead of Slovenia to fit in with the wedding of a friend of mine from my days in Turkey. 

The differences in these relationships are obvious to me now but it took me some time to realise that not all friendships are created equal.  Further the expat experience can be very isolating for children.  When I was a child I was at boarding school so I only saw my ‘friends’ in posting for a few months a year.  Moving schedules meant that someone you were close to one holiday might not be there the next but their parents might not have known about the move in the previous holiday so we would not have been able to say goodbye and in the absence of Facebook we lost touch.  It was this experience which taught me to evaluate the people I should become close to (and get their school address for letters) and which ones to be friendly with but not reliant on.  In some postings I was the only person of my own age which was lonely but had the positive effect that I become incredibly close to my younger sister and our parents.  That said I made sure that I had human contact beyond my family, as I grew older I would go into my father’s office for work experience with his legal team.  This allowed me to meet a whole range of people, either young colleagues on a first post out of university or the children of older local colleagues.  I am still in touch with my mentor from Turkey and the daughter of another colleague. 

Expat Children Can Be More Reliant On Family
For Friendship Than Other Children

My experiences made me worry for our own children.  They go to school in posting as opposed to going to boarding school so they do have contact with people their own age every day.  Nevertheless I worried about how we would explain the potentially transient nature of expat friendships to the children so that they would not be too hurt.  It is not helped by the fact that teachers often push everyone to be ‘friends’.  There seems to be no distinction made between friendly acquaintances and lifelong friendships (or BFFs as I am told they are called these days). 

But A Social Life Is Still Important

The people they were close to in Kazakhstan are now scattered to the four corners of the globe, to the US, Ghana, UK, Russia and of course many of them are still in Kazakhstan.  They see their photos on my Facebook and comment on them occasionally and they hope to meet up again in the future but they are beginning to realise that they have grown apart. They were far more wary about making friends in Malaysia as a result.  Our fast turnover of our time there meant 2 schools in 18 months making it very difficult for them to settle down as their classmates knew they would be moving on in short order and were also reluctant to get close.  This made the children very nervous in the run up to the move to Jeddah.  They were concerned that they would not have anyone to play with and it was a real relief for them when some of the neighbouring children knocked on the door the day after we arrived and invited them to the playground.  The children in their classes have been very open and welcoming and they have had arrangements for playdates off compound already.  As Master and Miss EE grow older they are starting to understand the difference between an acquaintance or short term friend and a lifelong one but are also seasoned enough to understand that sometimes a ‘now’ friend can be just the ticket. 

It Is Good For Them To Learn How To Make Friends And
How To Move On From Those Friendships At The End Of A Posting

We hope that our example, making a real effort with the people who matter most, helps them to realise that some friendships are nothing more than acquaintances, some are short and sweet and of the moment, to be enjoyed but not savoured while others will be for life and that all of these have their place.  Of course there is no telling at the start which friendships will be for life so we will facilitate them in maintaining contact with anyone they want to.  

Have your children had to learn to deal with intense but transient friendships in your postings?  How have you helped them adjust?

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A Walk Through Time

My #TravelAtHome this month is a combination of another retrospective (at least in part) and a bang up to date experience.

When I was 8 years old I went to live in the UK for the first time in my life.  At that time I did not know that it was to become a very important country to me.  Before that time my only experience of the UK was through period dramas (the BBC 1980s adaptation of Sense and Sensibility amongst others) on the Norwegian television.  While the English people I knew in Norway seemed normal (or perhaps, when I considered my teacher, cruel heartless individuals out of Jane Eyre and not really normal at all) I thought people in the country itself wore period fashions and drove coaches and horses.  I was convinced in this belief by the fact that, age 7, during a lay over in Heathrow early one morning I walked past the Sherlock Holmes Appreciation society lining up for a flight to Switzerland, all dressed in period costume!

King John's Castle at Odiham

Imagine my surprise, therefore, when we got out of the airport and straight into a normal car!  When we got to our house it was not a grand estate but an ordinary detached house in a commuter town and we had no maid or butler!  I was gutted.  My little sister, on the other hand was fascinated by the fact that she could understand everyone and spent a few days listening to every conversation she heard on the street with wonder.

The children enjoyed exploring our childhood haunts with their aunt.

We had a very happy two years living as expats in the UK before I stayed on to move to boarding school and the rest of my family relocated to Nigeria.  One of our favourite activities during those two years was to go on long rambling walks across the local countryside.  We did not have any pets of our own at the time as my parents knew their posting to the UK was short but we did look after a lot of friends’ dogs when their owners were on holiday so we almost always had a canine companion or two in the house. 

A walk along the Canal with my sister 30 years ago.

A popular local walk was along the Basingstoke Canal at Odiham in Hampshire.  We would park the car and then walk for miles along the canal, enjoying the views over the beautiful English countryside, the picturesque towns and the animals in the fields.  I remember that one field in particular always had Hereford bulls in, they are still there today, probably many times great grandsons of the ones I first met 30 years ago.

And with my sister and her husband in 2016

My parents settled for their retirement just round the corner from the Canal and my sister also lives close by.  The children and I are staying with my father for a few weeks (months!) while we wait for our new visas and a few weeks ago we met up with my sister, her husband and Archie the dog to walk the canal again.  It is, as is the nature of canals, unchanged from the experiences of my childhood.  Watching the children walk along in front of us I could be watching an image of the two of us 30 years ago.

We walked down to the ruins of an old Norman Motte and Bailey castle built by King John for use as a hunting lodge in or around 1207.  It was from this castle that he rode to Runnymede (now a scant 45 minutes away by car) to sign the Magna Carta.  His daughter, Eleanor, lived in it for a while with her husband Simon de Montfort but it passed to Edward I following Simon’s rebellion.  The castle passed through the ownership of the Plantagenet Edwardian kings and Edward III gifted it to his wife Philippa who once again used it as a hunting lodge.  It is possible, if you look carefully, to see the remains of the fireplace on the main floor.  It is quite something to imagine John, Eleanor and Philippa sitting in front of it for warmth and riding out over the countryside. 

Philippa, Eleanor and John's fireplace

Odiham continued to play an important role in English history and was the site of battles during the Civil War and, many centuries later, home to one of the Battle of Britain Airfields.  RAF Odiham is the home to the RAF Chinooks which can be seen flying overhead most days of the year.

As a nomadic expat I have very few chances to share experiences of my childhood with my own children.  They do not ski to school across the Norwegian mountains, go on trips down the Niger or live on the banks of the Tigris.  A walk along the Basingstoke Canal at Odiham allows them to do and enjoy something that I did at their age and I cherish that opportunity.

Posted as part of the Travel At Home link up.

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Adaptability

Expat life, for most people, is an ever shifting quicksand of postings, emotions, schools, jobs and friends.  Nothing stays the same for very long at all which means expats have to be flexible.  The situation which calls for the greatest adaptability is (at least for me and all the expat friends I have) the relocation process.  It is this moment that crystallises all the instability and uncertainty inherent in this lifestyle.

One of the strongest memories of my young life was saying goodbye to my father at Gatwick Airport as he flew to Nigeria to start a new chapter of our family life.  It was just a few days before my 11^th birthday and I remember my face was at the same level as his trench coat belt as I hugged him goodbye, I remember the feel of the material and I remember the exact spot in Gatwick North Terminal.  The reason that moment of my past is so clear in my mind is because it marked the end of my childhood; of course I still lived at home in the holidays but with his going our comfortable nuclear family life came to an end.

Moving is always unsettling

My mother, sister and I had to stay behind for a few weeks until the start of term at my new school.  During that short interlude my mother not only had to deal with my emotions at leaving home, at least for term times, my sister’s emotions at moving to a new home without a key part of her family, pack the shipment and deal with an unexpected leak, discovered when the bookshelves were moved, that required all carpets, flooring and piping on the ground floor to be ripped up and replaced.  It was that move that showed me, more than any other one, how adaptable expats (and trailing spouses in particular) have to be.  I remain in awe of how my mother managed the situation.  She might have cried tears of frustration, anger and upset but if she did it was in private, I never saw a thing.  I doubt I could be so strong.

It can take you from one extreme

Fast forward a few (well more than a few) years and I find myself in a similar situation (but without the pipes thank goodness).  Mr EE is now in post in the new country, a short term visa having come through while we wait for his permanent one and resident’s permit.  Until his permit comes through the children and I cannot move to the country, we cannot have our shipment sent on and the pets are mired in Malaysia.  This time last year we were struggling to get a tenant in our UK property and it was vacant for use but we were in Malaysia desperate for a tenant.  This year we have a tenant that we don’t want to lose so the children and I are sofa surfing around various friends and relatives.  We have had a few weeks in my sister’s house, firstly for dog sitting and then she kindly let us stay on for a few weeks, until, today as it happens, the house is being packed up to move her furniture into her new marital home.  We will move in with my father and step-mother for a while and take some long visits to my mother in law.  Hopefully the visas will come through before we outstay our welcome.  I was tempted to just get a holiday cottage somewhere but I need to be close to London in case I have to go to the embassy on short notice and rentals near London are prohibitive.

to another

It is one of the perennial problems of expat life, unless you keep your property in the home country vacant you have no real base, no home.  This is mostly fine but from time to time it can cause difficulties.  We are very lucky that we have such kind family and many friends have also offered us a visit.  Because our situation is so open ended we are just having to play everything by ear at the moment – adaptability has become our middle name!  It has given us an opportunity to help people out, however, give family a break from dealing with the farm animals at my mother in law’s, help my sister with dog sitting and the move, do some babysitting for friends.

Expats have to learn to carry their home with them

Master and Miss EE are pretty versatile and happy to be wherever they visit.  They have the dogs, history lessons and long walks at my father’s house and cooking, tv, cows and cousins at my mother in law’s house.  Mini EE finds the whole process a little more difficult.  At 16 months she is too small to allow her to walk around in non child-proofed houses so she has to be penned.  She has to sleep in a travel cot and get used to different rules in each spot.   The children are missing a lot of school so I am having to make up lessons (they are getting a lot of history, geography and creative writing, sadly my maths skills do not extend much beyond times tables).

Now that Mr EE is in the new posting they really want to be there and experience it for themselves.  Master and Miss EE want to see their school, get to know their teachers and find out if they will make friends.  They also miss their father terribly.  Skype connections are not stable at the moment so we are stuck with ‘just’ voice calls on What’s App for the moment.  We are trying to make sure that they get a flavour for their new home without over or under promising what they will find when they get there.  They too are having to learn to be adaptable expats.

So my key tips on staying adaptable over a long move or holiday 'back home':

• Have a plan but be prepared to change it.
• Don’t get angry when a situation changes, deal with the change and its consequences calmly, find out what you can and use that knowledge to alter your overall plan accordingly.
• Don’t stress about things that are out of your control, concentrate instead on what you can do (ie I can’t control when my visa will come through but I can decide what I do in the interim).
• Try to minimise 'stuff'.  Of course you need clothes, toys, books etc but carting it around is stressful so try to work out what is enough and what is too much!
• Answer any questions your children have truthfully and honestly but don’t allow them to wallow in worry and stress.
• If you are staying with friends or family make sure that you build in time for personal space for all parties, living with people is stressful, particularly if you or they are used to being alone.
• Set a leaving date, or at least a date on which you will review whether or not your visit should continue.  Be a gracious guest, help out with anything you can.  If you are staying with a people who have a maid do remember to leave a tip when you leave. 
• Don’t ask anyone for extreme favours, particularly those you would not want to do for others but be generous with the favours you offer in return. 
• Read up on new destinations, teach your children some of the local language (free apps are brilliant for this) so they don’t feel too at sea when they get there.  Help them do a research project on their new home.

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Roots

One of the places in the world that feels most like home to our children is their granny's (my mother in law's) house in the Durham dales.

The older bull - part of the family for many years.

She lives reasonably high up on a smallholding on which my father in law kept a herd of Dexter cattle and some sheep.  When the children were very young they used to love going to 'help' their granddad feed and water the cows and to pet his (very friendly and surprisingly gentle) bull and the little calves.  Indeed the animals were so much a part of their life that Mr EE had to tell the children bedtime stories about their 'adventures' when we were overseas.

His son, the younger bull was every bit as friendly

One of the great advantages of having the children grow up, if not around farm animals, then at least familiar with them, is that they have always been aware of the cycles of nature and the essential part of them which explains where their food comes from.  The first time they realised that the beef on their plate came from the cow they had petted on their last visit, they were a little upset but they have since learned to accept that the cows have a good and happy life and would not even have existed had they not been needed for food.  Furthermore, the efforts of the family are a critical part of supporting the animals and bringing food to the table.

The calves are tiny (Dexters are very small cows)

Sadly my father in law died some years ago but the cows have remained on the land and the children still look forward to going to see them and help their aunt (and Mr EE who takes over duties when we are staying) with the cows.  The herd will be leaving the farm soon, with the cows moving on to new owners, a real shame but a necessary move nonetheless.

Helping with the animals is a key responsibility

in summer and winter!

Animals are very important to us and, we believe, a most important part of the children's upbringing, teaching them the importance of care, stewardship, respect for the power of animals and hard work.

We are a family of many pets, and although the cows are certainly not that, they have given the children a lodestone of solidity and rootedness which many expat children find a little lacking in their lives.  In the years to come, Master and Miss EE will look back on their time on the farm with great fondness.

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Protected From Everything But Learning Nothing

This is the first part in a collaboration between this blog and the lovely Mr EE who, aside from being an expat parent himself, is also an  expert on education for expat children both in a wide range of different international schools and in boarding schools in the UK.  He writes extensively on education and we thought we would republish some of his work here in a new section of the blog in the hope it will be of interest to other expats searching for the right schooling solutions for their children.  

We are aiming to publish some original articles aimed more towards the needs of the expat parent so if you have any requests for future articles please let us know through the comments below or by email to ersatzexpat@gmail.com and Mr EE will do his best to accommodate the request in the future.

Protected From Everything But Learning Nothing?  Why Schools Must Embrace, Not Avoid, Risk.

Modern schools have become highly risk adverse environments, a trend which has been building for some years.  Both in and out of the classroom, our students are being presented with as risk-free an environment as possible, a place where they are highly unlikely to be hurt, physically or emotionally, and face few consequences for their actions which actually matter.  This has caused noticeable changes in the now-expected appendence of schools, such as redesigned playgrounds with soft-fall surfaces, anti-scratch railings and few moving parts, or the proliferation of marked tripping hazards on stairs.  Perhaps more insidious is the change in the culture of many schools, where competition against peers, whether academically or through sports has become less and less common: everyone is encouraged to ‘be a winner’, regardless of actual achievement.  But does a childhood spent in such a controlled and artificial environment provide the exposure and experiences which let students learn the lessons that will enable them to function effectively as adults in a globally mobile, competitive world?  Is this cushion from reality actually harming our children’s development?

Play that is too safe is not satisfying for long.

An increasing body of research and opinion would suggest that the answer to this question is yes, and that this conclusion has its basis in neuroscience.  Advances in neuro-imaging techniques show that experiences of all kinds alter the physical structure and pathways of the brain, so it is fair to say that experience affects the brain but equally, the brain affects experience.  Worryingly for our children trapped in the risk-free bubble, early deprivation can limit cognitive and emotional potential, whilst positive, attuned stimulation enhances the individual’s potential.  A child with limited exposure to risk and challenge when young will be find it harder to cope with the challenges of a normal adult life, leading to anxiety and depression, whilst over exposure can be equally damaging in creating a thrill-seeking daredevil who pushes themselves to dangerous extremes in order to stay sane.  Aided by our experience and knowledge of child development, phycology and neuroscience, it is entirely possible for schools to help guide children towards the goal of becoming thoughtful and considered risk-takers, rather that falling to the extremes of the risk-adverse or adrenalin junkie.

Risk-taking is a key developmental factor for any child, and schools need to understand its significance as a teaching experience for students.  Via the modelling, nurturing and teaching of good attitudes towards risk by adults, children will be better prepared to meet life's challenges.  Positive risk-taking behaviour involves actions or activities which, precipitated by consideration and thoughtfulness, provide a step towards the transition point between safety and danger.  Risk-taking, like other skills, needs to be learned and practiced over time, and can be summarised down to four essential steps outlined below:

• Identification: of the nature of the risk, be it physical, emotional, social or intellectual
• Awareness: of potential benefits and dangers and the range of possible actions
• Consideration: thinking through the impact of one's actions
• Evaluation: reflecting on the impact after the decision has been taken.

If we accept that striving to become risk-aware is part of child development and thus within the remit of a school's operations, then how can the school learn to embrace rather than reject risk in a practical fashion?

Don't wrap your children in cotton wool!

Aldo Leopold believed that ‘it must be a poor life that achieves freedom from fear’.  This statement followed the impact of one of the formative events from the end of his childhood.  One of the most influential scholars in the field of American environmental and wilderness awareness, Leopold advocated that all young people should spend some time in the wilderness, to experience a time when their own choices and mistakes may really matter.  Outdoor or Adventure education is one of the more common elements of risk education found in schools, although the degree of access that children have to it differs widely with the type of educational establishment.     Many of the characteristics of this type of education differ considerably from the common experience of the classroom.  A great many of such activities are voluntary, take place outside the normal timetable and location of the school and the journey (often literally) towards an outcome can vary dramatically.  A successful and well-planned adventure education programme will provide a series of opportunities for children to face progressively more significant challenges appropriate to their age and experience.  Challenge must be by choice, but the opportunities must be provided.  Expeditions may vary in terms of duration, environment or distance from home.  If done well, all should provide a step further on the child’s ‘adventure career’, providing opportunities to develop the skills and self-confidence in a guided and considered manner until the degree of supervision is so light as to be barely noticeable.  The desired culmination is that students are entirely capable of assessing and coping with the risks inherent in wilderness for themselves. 

Exposure to a sense of adventure should start young, but need not take place away from schools; in fact, for the very young, it is perhaps better it does not.  Play provides opportunities for children to learn self-regulation of their own emotions and behaviour: those deprived from play opportunities show little ability to do.  Normal patterns of play and the locations where it takes place need to provide opportunities for children to consider and take risks.  Often, when a group of children play in a planned playground, the strongest child becomes the leader, whereas in a natural or unstructured setting such as woodland, the more inventive and intelligent child comes to the fore.  As before, the desired eventual outcome of play is independent activity, where they children have the space and parents have the bravery to let their children go and experience the world for themselves.  Control over this aspect of their lives helps children develop the skills of teamwork and leadership.  The degree of adult control and supervision must reduce, slowly but inevitably, to allow the children more freedom to manage and control themselves and their relationships. 

Risk comes in many forms

If a school is to provide genuine access to risk on a daily basis, it must translate into classroom practice and methods of student learning.  A risk-friendly classroom is not defined by a teacher-centred carousel of pedagogical techniques, however, but the opportunity for the children to take risks with their learning.  This requires the teacher to lead and role-model an atmosphere of mutual respect where both the level and gaps in the knowledge of the students on any given topic are viewed as triggers for learning rather than reasons for ridicule.  As the students strive to develop understanding, they must be encouraged and given space and time to explore, enquire and find their own solutions, all in an environment where they feel able to make mistakes.  The learning outcome of such a risk-friendly environment is greater levels of creativity, ownership and motivation amongst students, where they have scope to innovate rather than simply follow instructions.  Students will be disinclined to take risks if they feel they will be punished for failure or humiliated in front of their peers.  Indeed, the atmosphere of respect must extend to and from all members of the class if individuals are to feel free to take emotional and intellectual risks in front of their peers, but genuine growth will only occur is this is so. 

The right school will encourage your child to take a leap.

Developing our understanding of the processes of risk and risk-taking behaviour allows us to facilitate the growth and development of our children.  The outcomes are considerable.  As a result of such risk-aware guidance, students will be more adept at seeking challenges, taking opportunities and resilient to disappointments.  In particular, risk-aware individuals are more tenacious in the face of failure due to a past history of surmounting small setbacks, guided by parents and teachers in how to tolerate, reflect and learn from them.  Learning to take considered risks in childhood prepares children to perceive issues of safety and danger with greater accuracy and respond appropriately.  Furthermore, they are also better prepared to think independently.  Students who are able to risk disagreement with others and explore conventions whilst maintaining their own perspective risk the denigration which is likely following any challenge to orthodoxy.  Children still need very clear boundaries on what is legally and morally right and/or acceptable.  However, children and young adults who think for themselves, acting from a position of consideration, thoughtfulness and in time, conscience, will find that their risk awareness is a key factor in developing lasting confidence with lifelong importance. 

Originally published October 2015

What do you think?  Have you noticed differing attitudes to risk between schools in different postings?  Does your current school have the balance right or do they need to improve their attitude to risk?

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Posted as part of the monthly Expat Life Linky posted by the lovely Amanda Van Mulligen

New Year

I have been looking over my posts for the last year – starting with my New Year’s reminiscences from 2013.  In that post I wrote about how much life can change as an expat in a short space of time.  2014 was certainly a busy and eventful year.  My husband and I both got new jobs (I left my new job behind in Astana, however), we moved country and had a new baby.  Our life now is about as different as it can be.

2014/15 playing on the shores of the South China Sea

2013/14 playing in the Astana Snow

We realised, as we celebrated the new year, that we have now been six months in our new home here in Sarawak.  We are settled, happy, have friends and know how life works here.  We have been planning trips to make in the car for long weekends and preparing our bucket list.  So instead of looking back I will look forward to what we would like to achieve in 2015.  I wonder if we will achieve it all….?

Best wishes to everyone for an adventurous, happy and prosperous 2015.

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How to find medical care in Astana

We may have left Astana a few months ago but finding (and coping with visits to) a doctor were such an important part of life there.  I meant to post this some time ago but  the demands of moving caught up with me.

Medical care in Astana ranges, in typical post soviet style, from the excellent to the dreadful.  You can find treatment for just about anything but you will not necessarily receive the comfort or care that you might expect back in your home country and the bedside manner is very different.  Doctors also subscribe to a holistic view of the person so expect to be given alternative and homeopathic remedies alongside your prescription.

Medical services in Astana can be confusing, particularly for expatriates as specialists transfer between hospitals so you may go to different hospitals on different days to be seen for one particular problem. Expatriates tend to have international standard health insurance managed through a local clinic, many of these claim to speak English.  Most of these claims are fanciful at best so be prepared to translate for yourself or bring a local friend along and give up all rights to medical privacy.  The standard of English at SOS is generally decent – they provide GP services and will arrange hospital appointments where necessary and attend with you to translate.  They have helped us with ophthalmologists, dentists, radiology etc.  OB/Gynae assistance was provided but was not as smooth as other services.    

Many of the clinic services will also claim to provide 24 hour responses but again not all of them do.  About one year in to our time there our daughter came to tell me that our son could not breathe.  I went to see him (of course this would happen when my husband was away on business and in the depths of winter), his lips were turning blue and he was rasping.  I was concerned that he was suffering from epiglottis (try working out how to explain that in a foreign language at 1 am) and called our clinic (who had promised a 24 hour emergency response) to hear that they worked only 8am-8pm.  I called our head of HR who was the emergency contact but she was travelling for the weekend and her ‘phone was out of signal.  As I did not know which hospital was providing services that evening I called our insurance international hotline and had my son assessed over the telephone.  They were mostly sure that he was ok but given his age and symptoms they wanted him checked by a doctor on the scene.  They were able to co-ordinate with one of the other clinics to make an appointment at the Mother and Child hospital and I then had to drive out in the middle of the night to find them.

Our employers changed clinics the following week and we found ourselves with SOS who do provide a guaranteed 24 hour response and ambulance services, in fact in the scenario we had experienced they would have sent a GP out for a home visit to decide whether or not hospital admission was warranted – a much better system.  A few weeks later I found myself using their services as I had suddenly become very unwell and needed an operation.  They arranged for pre-op  tests in Astana and then arranged for me to fly to Germany for the operation as they were not confident that the hospital providing those particular operative services that week was safe. 

Kazakh doctors tend to overmedicate. This collection
was for a simple case of tonsillitis.  

You can find yourself being given somewhat strange remedies – a visit to the dentist resulted in me being given super strength pain killers (phenol-barbitol!) and a herbal mouthwash.  When my daughter had tonsillitis we left the surgery with antibiotics, an antiseptic spray, painkillers, probiotics and a herbal remedy.  In the UK you just get the antibiotics and then only if you really push for them.  Conversely when I came down with tonsillitis a few weeks later I was given nothing at all except for instructions to have someone scrape my tonsils with a spoon dipped in hot antiseptic (they told me that I should ask my husband as I would bite the person who did it so it might ruin a friendship).  I was expecting our third child at the time and Kazakh doctors seem to take the precautionary principal very seriously with regard to medicines and pregnancy, the exception to this being herbal remedies – I was given prescriptions for all sorts of strange concoctions that I have to say went straight in the bin! 

Top tips:

• Make sure that your insurance registers you with a primary care clinic.  In my experience SOS provide the best service.  
• Download an app like google translate on your phone and enable a Cyrillic keyboard.  That way if you do not speak Russian or have an interpreter you and your doctor can communicate through google.
• Check dosage instructions, contraindications and potential negative interactions of medicines thoroughly with the Doctor.  Pharmacists will very rarely double check your prescription with you and will not happily answer questions.  Instructions on the packets will usually be in Russian or Kazakh.
• Following on from this if you are on regular medication bring it with you when seeing the doctor.  Sometimes your home doctor will have prescribed something that is not regularly used in Kazakhstan and it is helpful for them to be able to check the medicine and its interactions with any prescription they would typically write as they may need to amend their usual practice.
• While Dr Internet is a recipe for worry and disaster it can help to research your medical issues before you go to the doctor.  Medical paternalism is still rife in Astana and doctors will not volunteer information, particularly when there is a language barrier, you will need to be quite specific in your questions.
• Your insurance will probably have a 24 hour medical hotline in addition to the claims people.  Don’t be afraid to call them to check any questions you have with regard to your treatment or medication.
• Try to arrange for regular ‘well woman’ or ‘wellman’ tests to be done in your home country when you are back – it is just easier than wading through results in Russian and coping with different cultural norms of privacy.
• If you want your child to follow the immunisation schedule of your home country arrange for a letter from your home doctor outlining the schedule and provide this to your primary care clinic to arrange necessary injections.  You may have to give this to your child’s school and make it very clear that you do not give automatic consent to the Kazakh schedule.  We were quite happy for our children to sit on the Kazakh schedule but you may not wish to interrupt a part established regime.  
• Try not to worry – the doctors want what is best for you.  They might not explain in the same way that you are used to but if you are having a heart attack you want them to treat you not talk.  Methods of treatment may be different but at the very least they will be providing the best available care to you.  One of my husband’s colleagues had an emergency appendectomy at a local hospital and was well looked after – certainly better than having an appendix burst on a flight to Europe or Dubai. 

Click  on the picture for more posts on life in Astana.

Expat Memories

This week's post is a self indulgent memory. 

I have written before about the problems of bureaucracy that are created by expat life.  As we are sending a request for our newborn daughter’s first passport back to the UK we decided to renew our other daughter’s passport at the same time.  She has only about 8 months left to go so we may as well get it done now.  They should be processed together (or so we are told) and then we will minimise the amount of time we are without papers for the girls. 

Paddling in Lake Bohinj - Slovenia

I have been leafing through her passport and I realise it is a record of her life.  Of course, holding an EU passport means that many of her experiences are not tracked.  Her trips to Ireland to meet my father’s family or our holiday in Italy where she delighted us all with her ‘ballet’ shows.  Our four week driving holiday in Europe with our tenacious girl who at 18 months walked through Budapest with only the odd piggy back, paddled bravely in the icy cold Lake Bohinj in Slovenia and giggled away as we read George’s Marvellous Medicine to while away the motorway miles.  All of these are invisible - even her return trips to the UK to see her grandparents are tracked only in exit stamps from our host countries. 

Exploring Tuscan towns

But more experiences are documented than not.  The visas to Kazakhstan track her development from precocious 2 year old to sophisticated 5 almost 6.  Our tiny little toddler has grown into a confident child, quick to smile and laugh.  Our girl who could hardly dress herself now showers on her own and chooses her own clothes, makes her own packed snack for school and reminds her older brother to bring his sports or swimming kit on the right days.

Early days in Kazakhstan - learning to walk in the cold.

The stamps for Lebanon bring back to my mind our just three year old, meeting her Granddad, Step Grandmother and Auntie for the first time since leaving England.  I remember her expression when she saw my sister in the Airport – she ran straight to her and would not leave her side for two hours.  She was able to explore crusader castles, see the legendary Cypresses and the Jeita caves.  I remember her charming the military garrison at the Tripoli castle and the pair of us running dripping into the souk to get out of some truly nasty rain.  I think how lucky she was to go there before hell descended once again on that beautiful country.

Exploring Kazakhstan - Borovoye Lake

The visa for Russia brings back memories of her tramping down Arbat and through Red Square, frozen in the icy winds and snow that had unexpectedly descended on spring time Moscow – thank goodness we had our Kazakh winter gear with us.  Our brave girl walked for miles, undaunted by the weather but ever so grateful for a restorative hot chocolate from time to time.  I remember seeing the understanding dawn on her that Russian was  a world language –every bit as useful as English and not just for use in Astana and impressing the staff at museums and in restaurants as she chatted away confidently.

Playing in the Moscow Spring

Defrosting indoors.

The stamps for Turkey bring back memories of her first trip to Istanbul – exploring the Topkapi Palace, the cisterns and the Sulemaniye mosque – places I had explored as a teenager.  I remember her enjoying the Grand Bazaar – getting sweets, tea and cuddles from all the shop keepers we spoke with.  I loved watching her dance at the wedding of an old friend of mine and introducing her to people I had known and loved in my years living in Turkey.

Hagia Sophia (plus scenic scaffolding!)

They also bring back memories of our trip to the South West where I was able, finally, to fulfil a dream of 20 years and see Ephesus and Pamukkule and enjoy this with the children.  Our daughter discovered a love of carvings - one of my favourite photos shows her running her hands over some plinths in Aphrodisias (with the full permission of museum staff) – enjoying the tactile nature of the carving and then pointing out similar carvings as we went round the site.

Walking around Kaya Koyu

In my memories I see her spend her first day ever on a sandy warm beach  and play in the sea, my mind watches her learning to swim in the pool at our apartment, enjoying pancakes in a roadside café after roaming through the ruined village of Kaya Koyu and wondering through the famous Lycian towns that pepper this part of Turkey. 

Pamukkule

Her visa for Cambodia is redolent with memories of Angkor Wat, a place she professed (age 5) that she had wanted to see ‘since forever’.  She enjoyed her time there so much that one year on she talks happily of the beautiful apsara carvings and her friend Mr Theng, our Tuk Tuk driver.  When my husband and I married we honeymooned in South East Asia.  During the trip we went to Ayutthaya and I remember us saying that it was probably the closest we would ever get to visiting Angkor.  I am so pleased that this has changed and we were able to share it with our (older) children. 

Holiday in Cambodia.

Fascinated by carvings

When I look at her entry stamps for Kyrgyzstan I remember how she enjoyed the Burana Minaret and the trip along the Silk Road from Bishkek to Cholpan Alta on the shores of Lake Issykul.  She became very ill very quickly with a nasty bout of tonsillitis the day we were due to fly back to Astana.  It was not worth enduring a Kyrgyz hospital for antibiotics as we were due home in less than 18 hours and I remember how she bravely wondered from coffee shop to museum to coffee shop with a horrid temperature and a scratchy throat as we bought enough drinks to give her an excuse to sleep on a comfy sofa for an hour at a time before moving on to the next place.  I have never been so pleased to get back to our rather rickety healthcare provision in Astana!

On top of the world - sick but enjoying the old Kyrgyz Silk Road

Her final entries on the passport are her visa for Malaysia and stamps into and out of Brunei (trips to take Granny to see monkeys).  Every time I see her Malaysian visa I think about how well she has coped with this move (the first that she really understands), saying goodbye to her friends, teacher and school and launching herself into a new adventure.  The move has transformed her as well – there is less of the Central Asian sophistication and more of the South East Asian cute to complement her sunny, smiling personality. 

Six years on - playing by the South China Sea

So many of these experiences she has only had because she is an expat – we would not have flown to Cambodia from the UK, spent spring in Moscow, Christmas in Lebanon or Easter in Kyrgyzstan. She has packed more into her six years than many do in a lifetime and in the process she has learned to appreciate all the advantages that our life brings.  Whenever I am back at my father’s house I love to look through the pages of my old passports and the family photograph albums, marrying together photographs with stamps.  When our daughter’s old passport is returned to us I think I will scan the pages and put them, together with photographs and some memories, into a scrap book so that she can revisit them and share the memories with her own children in time.  

This blog is part of the My Expat Family Link Up hosted by Seychelles Mama - click on the link to read the other fascinating blogs on expat family life.

Click on the picture for more posts on the challenges of expat life.