Doing Just Great

I was in Melbourne visiting my daughter and her husband and two kids, and I was in a queue at the supermarket checkout when I noticed the elderly couple in front of me had broad Yorkshire accents. Being from Leeds myself I struck up a conversation with them, asking how long they’d been in Australia. ‘We came in 1965. Glad we did.’ I wasn’t sure what he meant. ‘You’re glad you came to Australia?’ I asked with a smile. ‘No. Glad we left Britain when we did.’ He screwed his mouth up, looked down his nose, and added, ‘Got out just in time.’ His wife was nodding and mumbling, ‘oh yes, oh yes’, in that self-satisfied way we Brits assume when we think we have all the right answers. ‘Things didn’t work out for you back home in those days then?’ I asked. ‘Bloody country was on its knees. It always has been. Better off here by far. Strikes, bloody immigrants everywhere. You know?’ He paused, and looked me up and down. ‘How long you been here then?’ he asked. ‘I’m on holiday, visiting my family.’ ‘Then you know what I mean,’ he chuckled. ‘No, I’m sorry I don’t’ I replied somewhat ruffled, and I let them gather up their bags of groceries and leave.
I asked my daughter and her husband if they get a lot of this critical snideyism of Britain, from ex-Brits. ‘It happens a lot,’ she replied, ‘specially from the older Brits who have been here since the 1960’s and 1970’s. Not so with the more recent arrivals, but even they are critical of present day Britain, the Iraqi war, the Labour government.’ ‘But surely’ I replied, ‘aren’t most of these immigrant Brits ex-Labour party supporters when in Britain.’ My son-in-law smiled. ‘Indeed’ he replied, ‘but coming here they feel they have elevated their social position, and are now more middle-class, or even upper middle-class. Coming from some very old rows of housing in Manchester, London, and Liverpool, these new arrivals figure they’ve died and gone to Heaven by coming to Australia. It’s quite funny to hear them go on about how Blighty is slipping gradually into the ocean of poverty and despair.’

We spent the rest of our holiday with many British and Australian friends of my daughter and son-in-law, and found them, in the main to be fair minded about Britain’s status on the world stage. After all, as one Aussie friend of my son-in-law said to me, ‘Britain is holding up its end in the war against terrorism, let alone remaining a solid power in the realm of world class countries. The whining criticism we hear from more than a few immigrant Brits, is quite disturbing. We used to call them ‘whining poms’ because they’d come here and whine about what they missed. Now they come here and whine about Britain. Sometimes mate, I wonder what it takes to please a Brit.’

At the airport we all had lunch together as we waited to board our flight back to London. As I lined up in the queue to get a few sandwiches and coffee for my wife and I, a chap with a London accent was going on about the ‘ropey’ looking sandwiches on display. ‘You’ll be glad to get back home then,’ I said with a smirk. ‘Not arf. Been ‘ere four bleedin’ years, and it’s all been a bloody waste of time.’ He asked me if I was going home for good as well. ‘Finishing a holiday here with family,’ I replied. He replied, ‘lucky bugger. Wish I’d been here on a visit before I emigrated.’