Paulkyville

Whilst I await word from the AHC, I thought I'd share with you my plans for when I (hopefully) get my permanent residency status, a plan I refer to as my Exit Strategy. Once all the hard work of selling houses, closing bank accounts, moving pensions and so forth is done and Mrs Paulky and I have our bags packed, the plan is that we will travel to Australia via the US. There are several reasons for this: It breaks up the mind numbing journey. It enables us to catch up with friends and relatives. We'll get to see a lot of the country. We'll be so broke afterwards we'll never attempt a journey like it again. If all goes well, our first port of call will be on the Sidewalker family , who live in New Jersey. We'd use their place as a base and visit New York, possibly going up to Niagara Falls too. Then it's down to Florida to visit a cousin in Miami. Having been to Florida before, I'm not too fussed about going to the theme parks, so it will likely be a few days ...

So I've had time to digest what's required of me, and I have to make a (very expensive, I suspect) appointment with a doctor recommended by the Australian High Commission. This involves blood tests, X-Rays and other medical probings. Oh how I look forward to that. (That's sarcasm, by the way.) I also have to have Police checks carried out to make sure I am not some hardened criminal (which, as someone pointed out, used to be the only way to get in to Australia!). This costs me £35. And finally I have to provide further evidence that Mrs Paulky and I are a bona fide couple; this one enables me to skip the Temporary Residence visa and skip straight to Permanent, so it's worth doing. Just now have to gather together suitable evidence, which makes my decision to have a clear out last month of all old documents suddenly seem unwise... One good thing that all this clarifies is that, assuming I get the visa, I have to make a trip to Australia before the medical and p...

Finally , after more than three months of planning and eight months since I stood on that beach, my application for permanent residency in Australia has been sent. Someone asked me recently if I was excited and the answer is no; my fate is now in the hands of others and I can't get excited until I get the official notification that they have granted my visa. Until then there will be much fretting! I still have medical checks and police checks to undertake and I may still be called for an interview. And there's always the possibility that I've missed something or done something wrong on the form an it all gets sent back. So keep your fingers, toes and any other appendages you may posses crossed for me please!

Do people who design official questionnaires really think about the questions they ask? I'm going through the Spousal Visa application form and there's a question on there which says something to the effect of "Did you marry just to gain entry to Australia?". Now think about it. If I answer the question YES, what do you think my chances of actually getting in will be? Now in my case the answer is an unequivocal NO, and as I've been married to Mrs Paulky 16 years on Friday, I think I can prove it. Unless of course this is all part of some secret master-plane I have been hatching for a decade and a half. It's right up there with the questions they used to (still do?) ask when you arrived in the US, the classic one being "Are you a terrorist?". I know an intelligent terrorist is an oxymoron, but I think even they could grasp the answer to that one.