EMIGRATING TO SCOTLAND WITH AN ILLEGAL ALIEN

For this post, I must take us back in time, to 1998, when we left Canada, once again and headed off to Bonny Old Scotland. I can already hear the howls of protest. Something like, “this is bullshit, we have already suffered, deep into Scotland! Move on will ya?” However, protest as you may, I cannot let this memory elude me. It somewhat goes against the nature of my posts, to ever say, “I told you so”. But this one time I am going to do it. The timing is somewhere about mid 1998.

I had been working, in Scotland, as a consultant with a US/Canadian joint venture company. At the same time, I was still trying to run my EPC company in Canada. This entailed working about 12 hours a day for them, and then working the weekends on my own business. The longer I was away from my office in Calgary, the harder it was to continue running it as a business. It so happened, that one day, the leader of the company I was working for, asked if I would consider closing my operations and joining them, full-time. This too help, in their pursuit, of capturing the global market for pipeline coatings.

At this point in time, I was travelling, while Deysi was in Calgary with the girls. I might add that she was not a “happy camper”. There was no end to the images she had of me, living overseas and travelling the world like a blue ass fly. In her mind, all I ever did, after 12 or 14 hours in the office, was party, party, party. In reality all I ever did was drag my ass back to my room and collapse in a pile on top of my bed. We discussed it and came to a decision. It went something like this, I did not want to give up the freedom of running my own company. Deysi did not want to be left behind while I travelled the world. We were kinda at an impasse. Compromise was necessary. So, we were soon packing, for Scotland. Now, who said there was no compromise in Deysi?

It was an exciting time. We had a house to sell, schools to arrange, movers to organize and immigration paperwork for the UK, to complete. Because of my mother’s and grandparent’s ancestry in the UK, we applied and were given a landed immigrant status. It was called Certificate of Entitlement of Right of Abode in the UK. We had to fly thru Ottawa on our way, to pick up our documents. The whole process was quite civilized and completed in a matter of weeks. Unlike Canada or the US where a similar type process might take a few years.

In what seemed like no time, we were landed in London and standing in another immigration queue. We had done this so many times in our past. We get to the officer, hand him about an inch of paperwork and wait confidently for our welcome to the British Isles. Typical, of our many other times in this situation, he shuffles the paperwork, sniffs, consults his fingernails, and grunts a couple times. He then comes out with his ruling on our application for Visa. After puffing himself up a bit, and peering over his glasses, he renders his verdict.

He says, “it looks like all is in order, except one thing”. We lean in a bit, too hear what comes next. “Your paperwork is for three persons entering and another one to follow”. “Yet you are 4, standing in front of me! Who is the one called Lassie H…d?” My heart sinks. I am starting to heat up. I glare at Deysi and Ange. I scream out, (to myself), “it’s that cursed cat. The one I told them, they could not have, because of our travels.” Now this guy thinks he’s just broken, an illegal, alien smuggling ring, and someone is going to the slammer. Again I scream out, (under my breath), “the cat, take the cat!”. I then stand silently waiting for them to cuff me.

I can now see a small glimmer of happiness in our situation. It looks like the cat will be denied entry the UK. “OH well”, I think. A small chuckle wells up in my throat. “Adios Amigo,” comes to mind. My future doesn’t look that dark after all. Who said there was no justice. After all, did I not tell them, over and over, “no pets”! It all should have finished right there, with a happy ending. Me fondly waving my goodbyes to the cat, as it is lead away to the slammer. But alas, they had not reckoned with Deysi yet.

She has been standing patiently, ignoring my happiness, and fumbling around in her bag. “Just a minute,” she pronounces. Then, from out of her bag, she produces another major sheaf of papers. This one bigger than the rest, combined. She has medical records, vaccination papers, pedigree papers (mongrel), education certificates, behavioural studies and more. Not only this, but she has somehow got the company, to guarantee all of the costs, of “cat immigration”. She plunks this down in front, of the now, overwhelmed immigration agent. I can see him sadly, radio the swat team to hold off, as he has further investigations, to make.

The defeated border agent now makes an attempt at saving some face. He once again swells up and pronounces, “Lassie H…d must now serve 3 months in a “cat prison” (quarantine) once you land in Scotland”. With that, he stamps away on our passports and tells us we are in. I’m still telling Deysi, “I told you so, no pets! Now you see what you have done?” She just gives me “the look”, and says, “what’s the big deal, our cat goes anywhere we go!” “Now deal with it!” And sure enough she proved this a few years later, when we had to move on, to the USA.

I’m still pretty pissed, but make my peace with the situation. I told myself, “who knows what could happen in 3 months? That cat, may not even want to come home by then.” We arrive in Scotland and the cat is locked up immediately in a pet hotel, to serve out its 3 month sentence. Deysi is heartbroken. Ange volunteers to stay with the cat until it is released. So, for the next while, our routine was eat, work, visit the cat, cry a little, repeat. You know, something that always stuck with me. I am convinced that from the outset, that cat did not have any idea who we were. I don’t think, it really gave a crap whether or not we visited it, in jail.

Alas, like a bad pandemic, that cat survived its imprisonment. It went in, as a plain miserable animal, but came out as a “hardened feline”. It stayed in a pet hotel in the countryside, got fed three square meals a day, had the girls come to groom it and bring it snacks. The jail, provided health checks, both medical and dental. It had the companionship of other hardened pet criminals. And at the end, I doubt if it even knew what we were doing in its life. In any event, soon it was back in the house, completely ignoring our presence and living much as it had, prior to serving its time in prison.

I end by repeating that, I told them NO PETS! We travel to much and they are a pain in the butt to move around. Apparently, my opinion mattered little in this household. That, my friends, is the end of my “pet memories” for this blog. I can already hear the howls of indignation from Deysi, Ange and Ron. However, I stand by the truthfulness of my written word, as if it had came directly from CNN.