Take it up a notch with the fact that we have 2 kids, no vehicle, and the only person you (think you) know in this new world is a guy you've never met, and don't even have a clue what he looks like.
Yup, that's us!
I (Mark) spent months doing as much homework as I could to prepare us for our new lives across the pond.
We went into this knowing that no amount of planning could completely prepare us for the unknown, but we did our best.
The first day we arrived in Edinburgh, kids all emotional after a long flight and no sleep, we met this mysterious man that we had been corresponding with via email for months. He was standing in the airport with a sign in his hands that said "KREMER".
We've seen that in movies different times and at airports for various corporate executives, but never for ourselves.
Carlo, a tall Italian man with a Scottish accent, spends the first day of our new lives here driving me around so that I can get groceries, a bank account started (with the Bank of Scotland, how cool is that), and get our cellphones (or mobiles as they call it here) going.
What a guy! In the first two days that we were in Edinburgh we realized very quickly that we had our work cut out for us adjusting to this new culture and way of life!
You can only imagine how helpless we felt having no idea where we were, no method in which we could contact anyone for help, no transportation as we didn't know where to buy bus passes, and no idea how to even run stuff in our new place.
If Carlo wasn't there for the first couple of days to help us out with the bank account, transit passes, and mobiles, we would have been way way worse off. He was (and is) a God-send.
There is a lot of bureaucracy here (as is in North America, just in different ways)!
We had a list of things that we knew we needed to get started, and then found out that there was even more things to add to that list that we had never even heard of.
Also, each different thing on the list requires certain forms of supporting documents and/or identification, and they all need to be done in a certain order, because documentation from one thing can/will validate another thing.
This is the part Carlo had no idea about because he's lived in Edinburgh his whole life, so we were completely on our own.
We needed to set up Council Tax (a monthly tax in the UK that you pay on top of your rent or mortgage), NHS (National Health Service, like Alberta Health Care but UK-wide), and schooling for the kids, and register with a medical clinic (or Surgery as they say here).
We were receiving the run-around and felt like we were going in circles with our paperwork.
No one seemed to know where we should start, just that we needed the documentation that they required before we could continue with them.
Finally we were able to figure out the first step, then from there on everything else fell into place.
When we looked back a day later, we realized that we had done all of those things in just 3 days, and 2 of them were on foot or by bus!
Now let me tell you about the flat in which we now reside...
The flat came fully furnished and ready to live in, and suits our needs perfectly!
We live in an area that is within a 1 or 2 block walking distance to a Surgery, shops and grocery stores, the place where you go to set up your Council Tax, a library, Halo's new school,and a giant park.
Similarly to Canada, you have to go to school in your (what the UK call) Catchment area (the area where you live). There were 2 possible schools in our Catchment area, and they just happened to be connected to each other.
Knowing nothing about either of them, and knowing that we needed Halo's registration with the school secured to aid in our acquiring acceptance into the National Health Service, we just walked into the one on the right and trusted God.
Immediately the door was closed, as they were completely full, with a waiting list. The 2 receptionist ladies seemed pretty snobby, so I was actually a little relieved when we were turned down.
So we went to the school on the left. We were registered immediately, and the Vice Principle (or Deputy as they call them) met with us personally and discussed how everything works. She was absolutely amazing! She was very sweet, personable, and was going above and beyond to answer any questions we may have and help make Halo feel comfortable. There was a teacher sitting behind her (who may end up being her teacher) that was really sweet and great with Halo as well! They even offered to let us bring Halo to some of the year-end classes there to get a feel for it, and let us know that they would tailor the curriculum to be able to meet her needs where she's at.
Another need that we have that I had been thinking about for quite some time was the fact that we are completely reliant on the bus system, but we need to do grocery shopping on a regular basis for way more items than can be carried on our person.
It turns out that some of the big grocery companies here in the UK provide internet shopping and delivery to your door!
We've been walking to smaller grocery stores for some basic food stuffs, but we just put in an order online for all of our groceries, and they will be delivered tomorrow evening between 7 and 9pm (that was the most convenient time for us) right to our doorstep.
We've barely even gotten our feet wet here in Edinburgh and God has already been doing amazing things in our lives! He is so good!
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