Raise your hand if you’ve ever moved to another country. I mean really moved. Like lived there for a year or so. I don’t mean you packed your things and backpacked around Europe for 12 months. I’m talking about packing up your life and starting anew in a whole new country. I admire anyone who has done it. Personally I think everyone should move countries at least once in their life. It’s the ultimate spring clean. When I moved from Australia to New Zealand 6 years ago my luggage was restricted to 20kgs. That’s fine for a holiday, but not when you are crossing the great divide to set up shop. Thankfully the luggage limit to the US is a lot more generous at 64kgs. Now that’s some serious packing. And it’s even better when you go back to Australia for a holiday. Because you can take a small bag and bring back a huge one filled with all the things you miss from home like Tim Tams and Caramello Koalas and Honey Baked Ham Kettle Chips.
The reason I bring this up is that when you move to another country you suddenly find yourself doing things that you haven’t done since leaving high school. Like setting up bank accounts, doing tax for the first time, getting a drivers license. Things that you took for granted for so many years. It’s as you try to tick these chores off the list that you suddenly realise that you are right back where you started. A complete novice. I’ve suddenly become a 17 year old in a 30-something year old body. However, you are not given the same graces as a 17year old…you know the sympathetic look of a bank teller with the “Oh this is your first bank account? Excellent. Congratulations, let me help you through it”. No, as a 30-something, you get the rolled eyes and the look of “Really? Do I need to explain this to you? I don’t care if you’ve just stepped off a 12 hour flight, how do you not know how to deposit a check?”. Americans seem to think that how they do things is replicated around the world, so the possibility that you don’t know how to do supposedly simple things like pump gas because it’s not how we do it on the other side of the world, is not a concept they can compute. They just think you’re a dumb arse.
So here’s what you need to know. Moving to LA is like getting on a merry-go-round. There are seemingly endless rules and red tape and regulations, and the way through the minefield is to find the one person willing to stick it to the man, forget the rules and help you out. The first thing you are required to do is to get a social security number. That in itself is not a difficult process. So long as you don’t mind the taking a number and waiting. And waiting. Get used to it, as waiting in sterile rooms with hundreds of others with a number in your hand, with no music, no colour, and no use of your cell phone will become your daily ritual. Once you’ve proved your legality, provided your paperwork and explained your visa (embarrassingly my particular visa is called “An alien of extraordinary ability” which provided much amusement to the man behind the screen), then you are issued with the instructions that your social security number will arrive in the mail in 
4-6 weeks. Sweet. Sweet that is, until you realise how much you are going to need that number in the next few days whilst trying to set up everything else. And this is where the merry-go-round begins. Most banks won’t let you set up an account without a social security number or a proof of address. How could I have a proof of address? No one knows I live here? I don’t even know where I live. And so begins the shopping around of banks until you find one that will overlook all these things and help a poor foreigner who is clearly at the end of his sanity.
Should you have a postal issue like I did, you will be introduced to the world of the US Postal Service. It is here that you realise why at one time US Postal workers had a reputation of going off the rails and embarking on mass shooting sprees. If you have ever been in a US Post office you will know why. I’ve seen the inside of prisons with more colour, life and a more upbeat atmosphere. I walked in wearing a red t-shirt. When I came out it was grey. Such is the effect of the blandness of this jail-cell like structure and those that work within. My need to go there was because I wasn’t receiving my mail. The first question I was asked was “Is your name on the post box? NO? Well how does the postman know that you live there?”. Are you serious? I didn’t realise I was supposed to have a ‘welcome to the neighbourhood’ gathering for all the local service providers. Is the fact that the house 
number is on the envelope not enough? Why should he care if I live there or not? And then I was directed to a phone number that I had to ring the next morning where they would patch me through to my actual postman before he starts his rounds so I could introduce myself and make sure that in future my mail was delivered. Awkward. “Um, hi. Are you delivering my mail? Because I live in this house now. Oh you are? Well no offence but I’m not getting any. No I’m not trying to tell you how to do your job. Ok, great talking to you”. And that was supposed to increase my chances of getting my mail how exactly?
Next step is transport. You cannot live in LA without a car. But don’t even think about leasing one. Or getting a loan to buy one. Because the word of the moment is ‘credit’. Get used to the phrase “So what’s your credit history like”? Short answer, if you have just arrived, you don’t have one. Doesn’t matter if you paid off every loan in your life, or never missed a credit card payment or a rent payment. As a new entry into the US system, you are nothing. You are a pimple on the arse of society. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Not only can you not lease a car with no credit, you can’t get a credit card, you can’t rent an apartment, can’t get a cell phone on a contract etc. Everyone wants to do a credit check. So how exactly do you get a good credit score I hear you ask? Simple, by years of paying your car lease on time, by paying off your credit card, by making your rent payments on time and by paying off your monthly cell phone contract bill. You see where I’m going with this? Welcome to the merry-go-round. I was lucky enough to find a landlord who liked the look of me enough to not bother with a credit check. However as I pay my rent directly to him and not through a rental agency, no government body knows that I am paying my rent on time and so my credit score does not improve. Arse. Luckily I was able to secure a credit card from a renegade bank teller who drew a one in front of my yearly wage to make me look far more financially secure. Nice fella. I’m sure in the months since, if anyone at the bank looked at my supposed yearly wage and then equated that to my bank balance they would realise that something is severely amiss. I will await that Please Explain letter. Not that my postman will ever deliver it.
So no matter what country you move to or at what age you do it, enjoy the local nuances and weirdness that makes up daily life. Be prepared to have bank tellers, DMV workers, postal workers and gas stations attendants all sigh at you on a regular basis as you stand there asking innocent questions like “how the hell would I know how this works, I’ve just arrived!” In other words be prepared to be treated like you are a dumb arse.
Oh and find yourself a good horse on that merry-go-round. It’s going to be a long ride.
Image of The Postman Always Knocks Twice courtesy of Marxchivist on Flickr
Image of the merry-go-round courtesy of The City Project on Flickr
Image of waiting in the social security offices courtesy of Jannus1 on Flickr
Hillarious and SO true. Even for those of us who have been here all our lives, we still run into the same issues. See, in America, we’re all about problem solving. Think outside the box! I’ll one day have you tell you about the merry go round that is the DUI / DMV suspension system.