Originally Posted by Bhoywonder

Just thought I would update anyone interested.
We arrived on the 30th June after a nightmare journey. The airline were great ( BA ) however the events surrounding the flights were not exactly how we had planned things. Flight from Glasgow to London, normally 1.5 hours ( 1/2 hour checking out the sights of Watford from 25,000 feet ) took us 2.5 hours due to a lightening storm. This delay pushed all the connections from then on in pretty tight. We jumped on the transfer bus from terminal 1 to 4 and in a mad rush to make our flight to Singapore ( departed in 10 mins ) I left my laptop bag on the bus. Now normally I would have claimed the insurance on this or reported it and waited to see if it had been found but this wasn't a normal circumstance. I had my passports with visa's obviously inserted in the bag as well. The next 30 mins were not the best I have spent in my life. As I was rushing to a BA desk to try and locate my bag, we were being offloaded from the flight to Singapore. I left my wife and daughter at the gate trying to sort out the flight as I was trying to get a hold of the bus company. I have watched Airport many times and had a laugh at the people ranting and raving at themselves as they had been so stupid. Yes that was me in this instance, the enormity of what I had just done was starting to hit me. No passports, no flight, no new life. We had to enter the country by 1st July to validate visa's. Things at this point couldn't have been any worse. Next thing that registers with me is the BA woman on the desk saying "we've got it". The smile on my face, if I could have jumped the counter I would have and given her a big kiss.
I got the bag and in the meantime the weather got worse. The flight to Singapore had been delayed. We were going to make it after all. We were put back on the flight and away we went.
We reached Singapore 2 hours behind schedule and fortunately our connecting flight had been delayed as well so we were able to spend some time in the lounge. Next leg of the flight went well and we arrived safely in Melbourne only to find that our daughters stroller, travel cot and my case hadn't made it with us. ( I suppose I expected something like this as we had been unloaded and reloaded ) I have travelled a bit in the past and sampled the same situation so I knew how to deal with it. We reported the missing items and to my amazement the ground staff told us they would hire a stroller and travel cot until ours arrived. Very impressed with this.
Next stage was to get through immigration. Very simple, queue up and present your landing card and passport, they stamp it and through you go. ( We found out the hard way by standing in the queue. If you have a child with you, you can take the lane next to the one the crew take. This just takes you right to the front. Wish we had known about that as we had a 14mth old on my arms as we had no stroller )
Anyway here we are and 2 weeks in. I've got to say I am very impressed with how integrated each of the institutes are. In 1 week we have been able to arrange our TFN, drivers licence, rental accommodation, bought a car, medicare, insurance for car, parking permit from town hall, dial-up internet ( you can pick up a disk from any telstra shop with pre-paid hours on it. very simple ) and attended a Melbourne meet, very helpful.
Everything has been very easy to organise and the people, well everything people say about Melbournites is 100% true. Very friendly, can't do enough for you.
So I start my job on Monday. We move into our rental accommodation on Thursday and looking forward to some reality. I will be glad when we have finally settled in a place as the serviced apartments are starting to grate on us now. ( Tip if anyone is planning to stay in the British Apartments. Make sure you don't get number 4 as this is just a room with your bed, kitchen, living area in one space. Make sure you ask the question. How many rooms is there. )
Anyway this is turning into war and peace and I am sure everyone has had enough by now if not earlier.
Hope people have found this informative and any questions then please ask.

I would like to say a special thanks to Flying Banana, Princess_atta & Flumper for making us welcome and helping us settle in.

Barrie

Originally Posted by meljor

Hiya, great thread which I read eagerly as we will be arriving at Melbourne on the 16th August. If I may ask a "thick" question, what's TFN? Please keep us posted on how you get on. Melx

Originally Posted by Bordy

You doing the nightshift to FB.

Originally Posted by meljor

Night off tonight Bordy, Mr Meljor has an urgent appointment at the snooker hall so Im baby sitting. Back on nights for three tomorrow though, yippee another 26 hours without sleep, can hardly wait Melx

Originally Posted by Bordy

Ive got one more night to do then off to Perth for 5 days, can't wait.

ps Tell Mr M that snooker tables are few & far between over here in Melbourne suburb land.

Originally Posted by meljor

Are you working now or is it nearly time to knock off? Ive just realised the time difference, . Hope you have a good trip to Perth, and as far as Mr M goes I am sure he will find something else to replace snooker, I believe the footy is fairly popular in Melbourne Melx

Originally Posted by Bordy

Yeah I'm working now ( or supposed to be) Finish in 15 minutes & get home by 5.10am.
Yeah the footy is brilliant, I'm sure he could become another Essendon fan.

BTW Barrie sorry for hijacking your thread.

Originally Posted by Bordy

You doing the nightshift to FB.