Brexit, Trump and the disappearing chocolate bar

As we wake up to the realization that the United States has completely taken leave of its senses, I thought I’d weigh in with a view from abroad. As an American citizen who last lived in the continental US after George Bush Sr was elected but before he took office, I’m well versed at answering all sorts of questions from foreigners about our crazy country. One of my personal favorites is “Why do Americans measure butter in cups?” But mostly the questions over the years have been of a political nature – “Will America elect a black president?” Probably. “How on earth did George Bush Jr get elected for a second term?” Haven’t a clue.

And while I’m disgusted by the outcome of what’s been a grotesque spectacle of an election, I’m not in shock. On June 23 this year I went to sleep in the little village in the North of England where I live, pretty certain that the country would rally together and vote to stay in Europe. That’s what the polls showed and that’s what the pundits were saying – a small lead, but a lead. Psych! Waking up very early the next morning was like waking up to the news that a close friend had died. I cried and felt sick. I denied. I looked into buying a house in Scotland and whether the fact that my grandmother was born in the Netherlands gave me a right to a Dutch passport (unfortunately, no). I grieved along with my fellow remainers. But then my denial turned to anger as is the natural way of grief. However, I’m not going to let the natural transition from anger to acceptance happen. I’m going to hold onto my anger because the vitriol and lies that were used to get people to vote leave and the resulting chaotic outcome will never be acceptable. No way. Not as long as I’ve got breath in my body.

Fast forward to this morning. This time I was going to be strong and not peek at the election outcome until a reasonable time – at least until the sun was coming up. But my phone was on vibrate and in the darkness I heard a quiet buzz. My Minnesota friend promised that she’d only send me a message in the night if there was going to be a clear Hillary win. I lay in bed trying to go back to sleep to no avail. In the dark I fumbled around for my phone. A short message from my daughter at university “I’m so sorry”.

And then the messages started pouring in. From my oldest friend in California was a bewildered apology and a question – “what must the world think of us?”. Well, yesterday morning the most read news report on the BBC website was an item on the changing shape of the Toblerone bar. In a post-Brexit vote world, imported goods have got more expensive. Rather than increase the price of this beloved confectionary, they have made the troughs between the triangular peaks bigger, resulting in less chocolate. This was an outrage in a chocolate-addicted country. The US election story had run is course. There was no way the American people were going to vote in that uncouth bozo when the opposition was so experienced. It wasn’t even worth thinking about.

But seriously, these are just a few of the things that the rest of the world are thinking:

• That Americans have it so good but are too arrogant to know it, which is why we're throwing it all away.
• That China and Russia are laughing their heads off and taking over the world as America heads for a train wreck of their own making.
• That the end of the Western world is being played out on the American stage.
• That for every intelligent liberal-minded American person that they’ve met in person there must be ten gun-toting nut jobs.

I’ve just finished listening to the episodes spanning George Washington to Barack Obama on the Washington Post's Presidential podcast, which is brilliant (except the bizarrely sycophantic episode on Reagan). Binging on this over several weeks, I have been reminded of what a tumultuous history our country has endured. We have had some truly great presidents who have seen us through some troubling times. Others have been mediocre or ineffective. However, we’ve not had one as dangerous as Trump.

The number of hate crimes has increased in Britain post-Brexit vote, and there’s no reason to expect that the same won’t happen in the US now that Trump has been given a mandate based on hate. We must keep our nerves steady, our integrity unswerving and be willing to put ourselves in harm’s way so that we can protect the vulnerable and all the rights that we hold dear. We cannot expect anyone else to do it for us.

Magpies and grey wolves

My husband sat down, leaned across the table and said “I couldn’t get the grey wolf in with the handcart”. I looked around the cafe conspiratorially. “Is that code?” He looked confused. I told him what I heard, which obviously wasn’t what he’d said. Once we stopped laughing, I asked what he’d actually said. He couldn’t remember. Welcome to old age.

We were in Le Petit Choux before the Newcastle United-Cardiff match, having decided that we’d have coffee and cake rather than a pint in the pub (another sure sign that we’ve entered our dotage). We’d secured an extra season ticket from a friend who was out of town and went our separate ways to seats in the Gallowgate end of St James’ Park. Even if you’re not a football fan, if you want to experience the true energy and passion of Newcastle, this noisy end of the park is where it is demonstrated most keenly.

It doesn’t matter than I’m an American woman in a shocking pink parka – when the team come out onto the field I feel tribal to my very core. I’ve even been known to get teary after a particularly tragic loss or a stress headache after a tense match. Having said that, I don’t join in the chants that NUFC fans are famous for, mostly because I haven’t a clue what the words are but also because they really should be belted out in a Geordie accent.

For those of you unfamiliar with Geordie, it’s not just an accent but a regional dialect of Anglo-Saxon origin. With words like gan (go) and bairn (child) still in common use, it’s not just a heavily accented version of English. And though it is an attractive, it can be rather impenetrable.  When I first arrived in Newcastle my first job was as a temp at an architectural firm in Jesmond. One of my duties was to man reception. It wasn’t long before I was taken off intercom duty as I just buzzed everyone in off the street as couldn’t understand a word they were saying.

It’s not just Geordie. A couple of weeks after moving to the UK we were watching what I thought was a foreign football manager being interviewed on the television. It went on for a while and I asked my husband why there were no subtitles. It was Kenny Dalglish. Enough said.

If you want to hear proper Geordie, go to a NUFC match. Not only do you hear Geordie in the chants and songs (Blaydon Races gets sung every match), but you’re surrounded by people speaking it unapologetically. In a world that’s becoming increasingly homogenised, there’s no effort to soften the regional way of speaking in the stands. For me, it’s lyrical and absolutely magic.

The language in the stands isn’t all bairn-friendly. On Saturday, there was an empty seat (one of the few) between me and a white bearded gentleman who looked a bit like Santa in a Newcastle United woolly hat. He watched the match, resting his chin on his cane, seemingly unperturbed by the excitement of the first half. Then a Cardiff player came to our end of the field to take a corner. In a rare lull in the crowd noise, Santa stood up into a low stoop, still leaning on his cane and shouted at the top of his lungs “you f*cking pr*ck!”, before sitting back down and resuming his deceptive friendly-old-man demeanour. The meaning of that was pretty clear, despite the accent.

After the match (which we won), we thawed ourselves out in front of the fire with a bottle of red wine and a couple of episodes of Poldark (mostly for my benefit). I glance at my husband, wine glass in hand and cat on his lap and thought that life is pretty good, even if he does say some crazy stuff sometimes.