Where Do We Live?

Because we’d been abroad and used our visa/debit cards, and aren’t particularly in tune with anything going on with our fairly dormant US bank, we decided to have our cards replaced. As a result of this, our online shopping things have been all confused, and we’ve had some interesting exchanges with companies about where, exactly, we live.

These conversations have been mostly concerning whether there’s a “stroke” in our flat number and things like that … but those are the ordinary ones. The extraordinary ones have been with our US bank itself, because they do not have any idea how to deal with foreign addresses. They would like to put us into the handy City / State / Zip-Code little boxes, and we just don’t fit. Why?

Because, if we were to be truthful, these concepts don’t really apply over here. Yes, there is a City called Glasgow … but, really, it’s not. You see, we actually live in the village of Charing Cross, which is part of the council of Glasgow, which is part of the kingdom of Scotland, which is part of the United Kingdoms of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. Nowhere in there, really, is there a City, nor a State, nor even a Zip Code. (We have a post code, which, like all post-codes here in the UK, can locate us to within 6 houses all by itself.)

The problem, of course, is explaining to the bank that, no, we don’t have a “state” so much … and that our “zip code” has a space in it, and doesn’t have a fixed number of digits, nor does it relate to anything like a city, but is just … for the post. It’s good at getting things through the post, but it doesn’t relate to a city at all, but to the main post office for your region. Thus, you may live in another city entirely, yet have a post-code beginning with G (for Glasgow).

What does this mean to us? Well, nothing, really, except that mail is … interesting. Thus we receive letters from our bank telling us that they’ve changed something about our address … and instead of living in “Glasgow, UK, Glasgow” we now live in “Glasgow, UK, UK”. Yep – they had slots to fill, so they filled them, and it doesn’t really make sense. As so many other things, the differences are very different, indeed.

It works both ways, though: the other day D. was trying to explain why it was important to have people specify whether their phone number was “home” or “cell / mobile” … and the person from the UK asked, “can’t you just tell, from the number?” Umm… no. In the US, they have these things called “area codes” and they’re good for both kinds of phones. Well, over here you may have a city code for a land-line (0141 for Glasgow and environs), but your mobile number will begin with “0787” or “0789” or something like that. Thus, over here you know what kind of a phone you’re calling.

So, where do we live? Through the Looking Glass, we’re afraid.

– D & T

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