First Catch-up with Lauren

I caught up with Lauren and it was all quite surreal.
 
On one level, it was like she had never moved away and we could talk with exactly the same ease as before about our families and feelings. On another level, it was like talking to a stranger, like someone I’d seen only on TV. She looked familiar, but the places and experiences she talked about were just so alien to me I couldn’t relate to what she was saying at all.
 
She’s done and gone through so much. Stuff like buying an unbuilt villa there and supervising the building of it, hiring workers, choosing and ordering supplies and dealing with problems. All this in a country with an alien culture and knowing less than one word of the language.
 
On a level I could understand, she came back to the UK when she did mostly because of an appeal from her daughter, Kathy. Kathy is seven months pregnant and was going through an emotional crisis; hormonal and not getting much support from her partner. Kathy wanted her mum – yet now her mum is here, she and her partner have gone away for a new year’s break for a week! Kids!
 
Lauren plans to stay in the UK until the end of March. She’s staying in Kathy’s flat while they’re on holiday and will then move to Devon. She won’t actually be staying long with her mum though – she’s applied for a couple of residential jobs. Good solution all round.
 
She plans to return to Egypt on the Friday before the Easter break and we’re talking about son and I going back with her – us just for a holiday, though!
 
Anyway, we’re going to spend some quality shopping time tomorrow and will no doubt manage a cream cake, coffee and bitch moment or two!