Tales of Repatriation

America 101 - Land Ho! - A Shipping Container Comes to America

Tomorrow is moving day - again. My lonely shipping container laden with all manner of misfit personal items, having cleared Homeland Security at the Port of Los Angeles, will arrive at my storage unit tomorrow after a 6-week journey from Singapore.

The moving business is an odd industry in that it thrives and survives – particularly during a pandemic – on the need for millions of people to get their stuff from one end of the world to another.

I have never had expensive stuff. Sure, I've had nice pieces here and there but I was never able or willing to dish out a lot of money for stuff like a couch. Or a chair. Or dishes. It was just never my interest. I'd much rather buy airfare than expensive stuff.

I come from a long line of proud stuff shoppers. My mother, sister, older brother, cousins – just about everyone in my mother's family - all enjoy buying (vintage) stuff – particularly skillets, cookery with wooden handles, and dishes. Lord my family has a lot of dishes.

#sendhelp

#motherhaseveryskilletandusesone

#brotherhas9spatulaswithwoodenhandles

#sisterhassettingfor12neverentertains

I, however, never got the dish gene (thankfully) and so my dishes are usually whatever is being sold at the grocery story (Egypt, Kenya) or Ikea (Singapore). It's fine and serves its purpose and goes away when it's time.

My stuff is cookware (I literally have none at the moment) and more random tidbits from afar that I picked up during one of my journeys. A few random samples:

Cameroonian birthing chair I bought from a midwife

Small, wooden stool bought from a basket weaver in Kenya (didn't want a basket – I wanted his handmade chair)

Bottle cap tissue box holder from Senegal

The "fat lady" art collection – street paintings of women with large backsides bought in Congo, Gabon, and South Africa

Angel statue from Thailand

Silk prayer rug from Pakistan

Tohono O'odham woven basket Arizona

Jeepney figured from Philippines

Ceremonial Arabic brass bowl won in Yemeni desert from gun runners (that story will come)

And the list goes on – so long, in fact, that it took 71 boxes to contain all of my random memorabilia, camera equipment, office stuff, books, framed artwork, and other related stuff when they packed it up in Singapore.

Moving your things, on land, is cheap. My moves in Kenya from one apartment to another cost me around $750.00US once the day was over. The moving company took $500.00US and then there was lunch for 10 people and gratuities all around at the end of the day. For those that wonder how anyone could spend $750.00US in Kenya moving house – here's a quick breakdown:

Truck and petrol $350.00US

Labor (10 pax) $150.00US (Yes, that's $15.00US/day for labor)

Lunch for 15 $100.00US (10 movers, housekeeper, plumber, electrician, security)

Gratuity for all! $150.00US ($15.00US/per person – not to the company)

Why 10 people? Labor is cheap and time is money. It's cheaper to have 10 people show up to pack and move you and get it all done in a half day vs. keeping the truck busy for a full day. Moving is a civilized process when you hire a proper service and includes said team coming into your home, packing every item carefully in specialized boxes, loading it all into the truck, and then unpacking it all nicely into your cupboards, etc. You're left 85% unpacked and all of the boxes are gone – fabulous.

Moving my things from land to sea and back onto land is somewhat the same process – people still came and packed all of my stuff and loaded it onto a truck (4 people vs. 10) - but the costs were much more painful. I was moving "mid-COVID" and shipping was at a premium in May given that so many ships were no longer sailing...the world wasn't shopping and factories were closed.

#rrrrrrrrrrrrrright

#covidstrikesagain

#covidisdiabolical

#ihatecovid

#covidapocalypse

The cost to use 45% of a 20-foot container to be loaded, shipped, and unloaded was a whopping $6,400.00US. Tack on another $100.00US or so in gratuity (depends on the size of the crew) and $400.00US for E#$!@$# maritime insurance policy and it will likely cost me around $6900.00US to have my ever essential, random goods bought on the side of several roads or in dusty markets, home.

It is good news that my container arrived and cleared customs absent any drama. Technically, Homeland Security can stop any container, set it aside for inspection, and take up to 30 days while they open every single box and take a look. Thankfully, I didn't have that experience.

But the arrival of my container is also the final punctuation mark on my expat life. Full stop.

My stuff isn't going to be somewhere else anymore. I do not have a home somewhere over there across the Big Blue full of my random bits to return to any time in the future. The container delivery day is hard because it officially concludes my life as an expat. And I really loved being an expat. For those of you out there who have reminded me that I can be an expat again, that's true. But my soul knows it will not be – not for quite some time – if ever. I was pulled back to America for reasons that have yet to reveal themselves and will have to remain open and willing to accept that information what it becomes clear.

As a friend told me last week, "...we will never go back to where we were – ever again..."

#wheresthegin

After 5 weeks of swimming through the kiddie pool of denial, I am beginning to embrace gratitude and I have slowly started to change my language, a little. When I am asked by my expat friends, "Isn't it hard to be back in America? When do you think you'll leave?" (Be nice, expats are a funny lot.) Instead of telling them, "Yes- it's just the worst and I miss my expat life every day", I've started to say, "Yeah, it's hard, but this is home now so I am focusing on what's next."

Trust me – that's a difficult thing to do when you've been an expat and didn't intend to return –ever. So my language is changing, my stuff is arriving, and I'm learning how to focus on what's ahead HERE (hapa in Swahili) instead of yearning for what used to be over there (hapo).

#Expat brain in progress.

#expat

#expatlife

#repatriation

#relocation

#publicstorage

#expatsarepeopletoo