First they came for the Polish plumbers. Then they came for the Romanian nurses, the Portuguese toiling in food processing and the young Italian baristas.
Off they went, group by group, back on those coaches and trains and planes (the French IT engineers were very sniffy about the ferries, the stuck-up frogs). By the time they were carting off middle-aged Mediterranean media & communications professionals you'd think I'd have seen the writing on the wall.
Sure, I'd been wearing the regulation armband with the 12 yellow stars on a blue background. They make some really stylish ones these days and it seemed like a small ask, all things considered, a form of courtesy really, that I should make it possible for my fellow workers/commuters/shoppers/voters/audience members in the busy metropolis to identify me as an LEF (Legal European Foreigner).
Some natives have allergies and stuff - we bring them out in boils, bouts of hysteria, projectile vomiting, head swivelling, the lot, and they have a right to know, surely, a right to avoid us. It is not their fault - it's nobody's fault. It's just one of those things.
The armband was fine, really. A small sacrifice, if you can even call it that, when we were generously supplied one for free. Some of the usual suspects moaned about a link between the armband wearing and an increase of instances of LEFs being spat at in the street. Look, it's just saliva people! A bit of saliva has never killed anyone, outside of Ebola infected zones.
My British husband was ever so reassuring: you are married to me, he would say, you're practically a Brit. He was ever so patient, waiting for me at passport control at the return from every holiday, while I was deloused and power-showered at the end of long, long, line of Returning LEFs.
The armband was fine, really. A small sacrifice, if you can even call it that, when we were generously supplied one for free. Some of the usual suspects moaned about a link between the armband wearing and an increase of instances of LEFs being spat at in the street. Look, it's just saliva people! A bit of saliva has never killed anyone, outside of Ebola infected zones.
My British husband was ever so reassuring: you are married to me, he would say, you're practically a Brit. He was ever so patient, waiting for me at passport control at the return from every holiday, while I was deloused and power-showered at the end of long, long, line of Returning LEFs.
That one single unpleasant incident (an unnecessary vigorous strip-search followed by 48 hours detention ) when I forgot the folder with all my documentation was soon forgotten. My fault entirely. It is quite ridiculous in this day and age to still think you can hop off on holiday with just your passport, for heaven's sake! What next? Inter-railing with a library card, cruising with a bus pass?
Now my LEF Papers (birth certificate, NHS registration number, Residency Permit, National Insurance Registration, mortgage agreement, Rabies Certificate and last but not least my -laminated- job contract) are neatly packed and ready to go anywhere with me. And it seemed like a hopeful sign when the Documentation Zone Threshold was extended to journeys longer than 20 miles: the commute into work became a lot less tiresome without the folder, let me tell you.
So you see, I played by the rules, was understanding and patient. But fundamentally I didn't think they would ever come for me because - how shall I put it without blushing - I simply did not know I was an EU migrant. I thought I was an EU citizen. Not as good as a UK citizen, I grant you, but a benign subspecies which could operate on these shores, pay taxes, purchase property, work hard, marry a native whilst still not breaking any laws.
I did not, in all these years, saw myself as someone who had migrated to this country: this was the country I had chosen to live and work in out of 27 others that constituted the bit of the 21st century world that was my oyster. I never realised my taxes were such a bother to collect, or that my speaking Italian on my mobile on crowded buses had traumatised so many, or that my annual GP appointment had put such a horrible strain on the NHS in my area.
So at the flick of the Brexit Switch, when LEFs where turned into EFs - European Foreigners - I was suddenly illegal without ever having fully realised that I was one of those nasty, cheating, grasping, oxygen-sucking, job-stealing, benefit-cheating, space-taking immigrants at all.
I'm glad they got me. I'm glad they sent me back. Britain is no doubt safer and more prosperous without the likes of me. And I have found a new calling and a very good living in my old country surprisingly quickly.
I'm with the special de-Britting task force that's liberating Tuscany from the 20-year old infestation of British semi-retireds. We're confiscating second homes and arresting on sight any grown-up walking about in a football strip. The Brits are bad at carrying their paperwork but you can always spot them a mile off from their horrendous clothes.
Now my LEF Papers (birth certificate, NHS registration number, Residency Permit, National Insurance Registration, mortgage agreement, Rabies Certificate and last but not least my -laminated- job contract) are neatly packed and ready to go anywhere with me. And it seemed like a hopeful sign when the Documentation Zone Threshold was extended to journeys longer than 20 miles: the commute into work became a lot less tiresome without the folder, let me tell you.
So you see, I played by the rules, was understanding and patient. But fundamentally I didn't think they would ever come for me because - how shall I put it without blushing - I simply did not know I was an EU migrant. I thought I was an EU citizen. Not as good as a UK citizen, I grant you, but a benign subspecies which could operate on these shores, pay taxes, purchase property, work hard, marry a native whilst still not breaking any laws.
I did not, in all these years, saw myself as someone who had migrated to this country: this was the country I had chosen to live and work in out of 27 others that constituted the bit of the 21st century world that was my oyster. I never realised my taxes were such a bother to collect, or that my speaking Italian on my mobile on crowded buses had traumatised so many, or that my annual GP appointment had put such a horrible strain on the NHS in my area.
So at the flick of the Brexit Switch, when LEFs where turned into EFs - European Foreigners - I was suddenly illegal without ever having fully realised that I was one of those nasty, cheating, grasping, oxygen-sucking, job-stealing, benefit-cheating, space-taking immigrants at all.
I'm glad they got me. I'm glad they sent me back. Britain is no doubt safer and more prosperous without the likes of me. And I have found a new calling and a very good living in my old country surprisingly quickly.
I'm with the special de-Britting task force that's liberating Tuscany from the 20-year old infestation of British semi-retireds. We're confiscating second homes and arresting on sight any grown-up walking about in a football strip. The Brits are bad at carrying their paperwork but you can always spot them a mile off from their horrendous clothes.
Brilliant!
ReplyDeleteThis is exactly the reaction Commonwealth citizens had when Ted Heath dropped them in favour of our new EU 'family'. So people who'd fought wars alongside us had to wait in a queue whilst people who'd been shooting us previously were whizzed through.
ReplyDeleteMolto carino.
ReplyDelete