"You are not welcome here,"

is perhaps one of the hardest things anyone can hear. If you cannot even hear then it is perhaps even harder.

A Canadian friend called in yesterday. He has been out here for almost three years now. His company sent him here and they were even suggesting he might stay another two years but he has chosen to go back to Canada.

The reason for going back is his partner, his lovely M...  His relationship with M... is very loving and very close. It is a relationship many people would believe to be very difficult because M... is profoundly deaf and C.... is hearing. C... grew up in a family where there were profoundly deaf people. He grew up "trilingual". He uses Canadian Sign Language as easily as he uses English.  He also studied French at school and although not quite as proficient in that language he can hold a conversation in it.

M.... uses CSL most of the time - or she did while she was here. When I first met her I wondered how she would cope. Lip movements are different here and trying to lip read her third language, English, was clearly a problem. Her first language is CSL and her second is French. She has a degree in maths. M... is highly intelligent and can often be very funny indeed. We got on very well together although the communication barrier was so high. Even finger spelling was a problem because she uses a one handed alphabet and I use a two handed alphabet. 

Never mind all that. We made an effort. Occasionally she came down from their little unit in the hills behind me and we would spend some time together.

But, for all I tried, she was lonely here - very lonely. She wanted to meet people but a group I thought might make her welcome told her she was not welcome. It was a real shock to both of us. C... had been prepared to go with her and interpret. I would have helped too. No, they did not want her. 

M... did not push the issue. There was a small "home church" group which tried to make her feel welcome. It was fine on Sundays when C... was with her but at the craft group it was much more difficult. I was asked to help but I could not always be there. M... would go when I could go. We both giggled over the issue that you cannot sign and knit at the same time. It was just as well we could because, underneath all the giggling, there was real hurt and anxiety and loneliness.

I encouraged M... to put items into our state RAHS Show. She did and I was delighted when she won prizes for everything she entered. Her sock knitting is superb. She passed on her crochet hats to me and I sent them off to the Alice Springs Beanie Festival. They sold and she rather shyly presented me with the money for a scholarship fund for African girls. It was her way of thanking me.

After long discussion with her partner and with me M... went back to Canada early. They could communicate via the internet of course but it was not the same. M... missed him. C... missed her. 

Yesterday C... told me how much he was looking forward to being with M... again. We both agreed how much courage it had taken for M... to come and how difficult it is if you do not speak the language, cannot communicate easily.  

If anyone in that group is still silently spying on this blog (and I know you have from time to time) then I have this to say to you, "I am ashamed of you. You claim "everyone is welcome" but we all know it is not true."