Sauntering Vaguely Downward

After returning from Germany reasonably early on Friday, it wasn’t too difficult to muster the energy to journey to Oxfordshire for a visit to the Ai Weiwei sculpture exhibition at (Unesco World Heritage Site) Blenheim Palace.

Blenheim isn’t a National Trust or English Heritage property, so we don’t have memberships that cover it. It’s also an eye-watering £22.50 per adult for a day admission. However, once you’ve paid it, you can convert this to an annual membership and come back any time you like for the subsequent year. Since Humuhumu had a lot of energy to run off by the time we got there (it’s over an hour’s drive from home) and we didn’t get to spend any time indoors, we’re determined to go again in a couple of weeks to at least attempt to see the sculptures that are housed inside the Palace.

It was a blowy, blustery day and Humuhumu loved dashing around the majestic grounds, helping us to hunt down the sculptures. The symmetrical shiny blue-purple stones were the hands-down favourites.


[Image of Humuhumu running through one of Ai Weiwei's sculptures at Blenheim Palace.]

( More words and pictures )

Hours of fresh air and exercise tired everyone out, so I’m afraid poor Bloke had to drive home with only the dulcet tones of Radio 4 playing “Under Milk Wood” by Dylan Thomas* to drown out the snorkeling of his passengers.

* NB: I do not recommend listening to this whilst dozing unless you enjoy having very strange dreams.

The next day everyone had a lie-in, even Humuhumu, who slept until almost 8 AM. (Note to Daughter: More Sundays like this please.) Once we were up, we went to the garden centre to get wallflowers and pansies to plant in our front pots, as the geraniums were beginning to flag in the cooler weather. We are once again keeping up appearances in our village, to the relief of the neighbours, I'm sure.

In the afternoon, we headed to the Avoncroft Museum nearby for Trebuchet and Cannon Reenactment Day. We texted some other parents on the off-chance that they were at loose ends for Sunday activities, and to our immense surprise, everyone turned up. Humuhumu was delighted at the company. The four-year-old girl pretty much adopted Humuhumu, and cried when her Daddy tried to take her away before she could give her a goodbye cuddle and kiss.

The other children didn’t much care for the noisy cannon demonstrations, but Humuhumu’s response to every firing was a passionate demand for “MORE BANG!” and “Nani do it!” Oh dear.

Also filed under Oh Dear: Humuhumu has got quite a strong Brummie accent at the moment. Here is an attempt to record her pronunciation of a few words/phrases. I need to get some video of this for posterity before she loses it, which she very probably will when she’s older. She doesn’t hear any Brummie at home or from our friends and relations.

Bye Bye = “Buh Boy”
Like a diamond in the sky = “Loik a doymund in da skoy”
Bus = “Booss”
Daddy = “Dah-doy”


[Humuhumu and Dada at the trebuchet & cannon-firing display at the Avoncroft Museum. She’s in the middle of a request for “MORE BANG” here.]

In which there were episodes of Cat and Girl,



( Handsome Cat, Peculiar Parents, Lovely Pub )

And finally, episodes of walks with friends by the canalside.


All in all, a resounding success.

8. Enjoying emotional constipation. I have British friends. No honestly, I do. They'd probably die of embarrassment if I named them, though. I might speak of them as my friends if I were certain I was with people who would likely never meet them. And I would never be so callous as to tell them how I felt about them or how much they mean to me. Not unless we were all really drunk, because we'd all understand that as I was in my cups, it was never to be spoken of again.

So if you consider me a friend, I beg you not tell me about it lest I be forced to make some flippant remark to deflect my discomfort and spend the rest of the day blushing.

[Image: A newly minted Brit with an experienced crew.]

Today, I became a British citizen.

I spent most of yesterday feeling faintly embarrassed at the prospect. Eventually I worked out that this was because of the ceremony, which struck me as a rather un-British and ostentatious as a concept. Unless, as I suspected it didn’t, the ceremony consisted of going to the pub, sitting around with your mates and having someone walk up with a gin & tonic, clap you on the shoulder, say, “Congratulations, old bean,” in a delightfully plummy accent* and saunter off.

I was right about the ceremony not being that, but wrong about it being ostentatious. I opted to participate in a group ceremony. Eighteen of us queued nervously downstairs in the county hall, then shuffled upstairs and queued again outside the registry room. Finally we were ushered to an orderly semi-circle of chairs to wait quietly in what was effectively a seated queue while Elgar was piped softly to us through the room’s PA system. Laminated placards with the Oath or Affirmation of Allegiance (including polite notice to return said cards at the end of the ceremony) were placed neatly on the chairs. We picked them up and studied them.

A local councillor read a brief history of Worcestershire to us. Most of the content failed to reach my mind, I’m afraid, as it was nervously reciting the Affirmation so I could say it clearly when the time came. The woman speaking had a lovely soothing voice, so I caught a few phrases here and there - Worcestershire sauce, A. E. Housman, the Malvern Hills.

Then it was time for us to speak. Half of the semi-circle stood to read the Oath of Allegiance. This included the other North American (an older white-haired gentleman), the black couple (dressed to the nines - waistcoats were involved), the East Asian family and their three children and the guy in the high-vis vest (more on him later). We applauded them after they had carefully repeated all the words. Then the other half of the semi-circle, including the Middle Eastern, Asian, Chinese persons and me, stood to recite the Affirmation of Allegiance (the God-free version). I felt like my voice sounded out above the others as I was trying to project my voice very clearly, which was later confirmed by my refreshingly honest mother-out-law.

We all stood together to speak the Pledge, in which we promised to uphold British rights and freedoms and to respect British law.

The officiators and other attendees** smilingly applauded us as we grinned at one another, relieved.

We were called up individually to collect our certificates. They used our full names, which, impressively, were pronounced correctly. (Mine wasn’t the longest and most torturous, as I was sure it would be.) A professional photographer took photos of us in front of the gracefully draped Union flag. When he arrived at the chap wearing the high-vis jacket, there was a ripple of laughter as the photographer told him, “Mate, you’re going to have to get rid of that or the photo’s just going to be a big yellow blur.” He removed it, self-consciously straightening the collared shirt that was clearly the one concession to the ceremony he’d made for the two hours he was being allowed off the job to attend, untucking and pulling it down over his paint-spattered jeans so the photo would turn out well.

We were welcomed once more as newly minted British citizens. We stood as an instrumental version of “God Save the Queen” was played to us. Since I have still known this tune as “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” for far longer, my brain conjured up an exciting and entirely inappropriate mishmash of lyrics that I was immensely relieved not to be singing aloud.

Afterward, we were allowed to take our own photos in front of the flags and photos of the Queen (which we politely queued up to do). Tea and biscuits were also involved.

You might think that after nearly nine years in this country, in which I’ve made a home and had a baby, going through a citizenship ceremony might not make me feel all that different. But it has. It’s a rebirth. This is Day One.

( +1 )

* Accent could be subject to regional requirements, which would be entertaining. In Norfolk, they could for instance say, "Roight, boyo!" Suggestions for other county-specific variants welcome.
**I brought by far the largest number of guests - six, including the out-laws, bloke, Humuhumu and imyril and her boy.

[Image of Humuhumu in her black n00b onesie, holding the toes of her left foot in her hand.]

Hello, Mummy's flist/dwircle.
You'll be glad to know that I'm now half American!

After my first nursery visit on Thursday morning, which I enjoyed immensely, Mummy & I walked around the Winterbourne Botanic Gardens near the university while Daddy worked. It was cold but lovely and the tea room was full of ladies who thought I was the cutest thing ever, which is of course correct.

Then we all traveled down to London by train. I enjoyed the train ride but the tube journey was not so fun during rush hour. We had to get off one tube because I started howling. Daddy walked up and down the platform and I calmed down a bit but then we got on another tube train to continue so I had a chance to annoy a whole new set of commuters until I gave up abruptly and went to sleep. We met dizzykj in the lift at Elephant & Castle tube station and traveled to her house by bus while I cried. Mummy fed me for a while and I went back to sleep.

The next morning we all got up early and prepared for the trip to the American embassy. Unfortunately, Daddy's trousers ripped from about halfway down his thigh to the crotch. We didn't have time to buy him a new pair so Mummy had him tie a jumper round his waist & we all hoped no one would notice. (They didn't.) We stopped off at Mummy's work to drop off our suitcase and their phones because those aren't allowed in the embassy. But when we got to the embassy we discovered that Daddy still had his remote-control car key on him. Those are also not allowed. There was some disagreement about whether or not Mummy had informed Daddy of this stipulation. It was not resolved, but the nice security man stepped in before the "discussion" could get any warmer and told them that there was a storage facility down the street. Mummy took the car key there and Daddy & I went in to start the waiting process.

It took a total of 2.5 hours to get all the paperwork processed and Mummy & Daddy interviewed to ensure that they told the truth on my forms. The consular officers were kind to us and the waiting room was full of other babies and their parents, so it was a pleasant, if long, experience. At the end of it, the consular officer (who liked my cupcake outfit very much) said, "Congratulations, Humuhumu! You are now an American citizen," as I was being held by my British Daddy in his torn trousers.

The rest of the weekend is something of a blur but I know we saw Mummy's work colleagues, including flexagain. I met purplecthulhu and he gave me a present from Mauna Kea observatory, which was so thoughtful. I tried guacamole, lime and black beans. I attempted to nab sushi but Mummy was boring and wouldn't let me eat raw salmon. I went on many forms of transport including:

• Car (Mummy & Daddy's)
  
• Tube (Bakerloo line, District line, Victoria line, Central line)
  
• Bus (2, 10, 168)
  
• Train (London Midlands, Chiltern Railways)
  
• Taxi (The famous London black cab!)

We saw brother & sister-out-law as well as my cousin before we got on a train to come home yesterday. I slept a lot today.

Mummy sends her apologies to the Londoners we didn't have a chance to see, especially imyril. It's snowy and icy and cold here. Mummy says it's spring, but as I have yet to experience the warmth she claims that season brings, I shall reserve judgment. Good night.