slapphead_otool

I have been in Australian almost 25 years now. I came here via France, and before that Dubai, so I was a seasoned expat.

It was very different when I arrived. Amazingly there was no ISDN phones. To call my parents I had to go via the operator. The whole of Sydney closed at lunchtime on Saturdays. Union rules. The trains were “red rattlers”, with open doors, around which passengers would crowd to get a cooling breeze. No aircon on those trains.

Bob Hawke was the PM. I saw him in a hotel lift one night. Just me and the PM. He said “g’day Mate” when I got in. I remember thinking; that wouldn’t happen in the UK.

I was a true expat, on a company posting. Life was good. The economy was booming. The FBT was yet to be introduced, mining and minerals were pushing things along. Money seemed to flow like water, as did jobs. I remember at a party some guy offering me a job out of the blue, with a 50% pay increase.

I covered all of Australia. Sadly not the tourist bits, I spent time at places like Mount Isa, Kalgoorlie, and Roxby Downs. When I wasn’t somewhere in Australia I was in Asia. This was long before mobile phones and emails. Every morning I would collect messages, facsimiles and telexes from reception. Other than that no one in the world knew where I was, or what I was doing. And I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t admit to sometimes just laying on a beach, taking an extra day in some out the way place.

I flew all over Australia with Ansett. Now long gone. I knew most of the crews, I spent so much time on the planes. One week I had every meal for seven days on an aircraft, and slept in a bed twice. Jakarta, Perth, Singapore, Melbourne, Adelaide, KL. All one big blur of hotel rooms and aircraft seats.

I religiously called home once a week, and bought English newspapers, about 2 days old. I didn’t understand Australian politics, or culture. I remember sitting next to Malcom Frazer on a plane. When he introduced himself I said “Good God, I thought you drowned off a beach years ago”. “No you bloody fool”, he replied, “that was Harold Holt”.

I extended my contract. I still flew home regularly. One trip back I was in my local. They had just installed MTV or something. Icehouse Electric Blue came on, with its Sydney backdrop. “Wow, there’s home” I said without thinking. The darts team stopped talking and you could hear a pin drop. It was a seminal moment. I had become an Australian.

Lots have happened over the 25 years. Married. Served in the army. Started a business. Been back to University x2. Divorced. Remarried.

Lots of good memories. Standing on a boat in the harbour for the 1988 Bicentennial. Same boat, same harbour, 2000 Olympics fireworks. Drinking beer in a ghost town in WA. Standing on a North Queensland beach at dawn. Not many bad memories.

So the point of this post: A lot of BEs seem unhappy in Oz. “20 years behind the UK”, “Life on Mars”, “cant wait to get home” etc. Others seem desperate to get here, and in the desperation overlook that this is a different country. It’s not another county of the UK. It’s a bloody big, relatively unpopulated country, where life is what you make it.

For Christs sake people:

1. Think carefully before you come here. It’s a big step. It isn’t England. No corrie and fish and chips. It has good parts and it has bad parts. Its not somewhere to run away too. If you are unhappy in your life in the UK, or you are unsuccessful, then your life will be the same here. Moving here wont lose the extra kilos, or make you look like Brad Pitt. If you are a Bum in Birmingham then you will be a Bum in Brisbane.
2. If you are here, give it a fair go and think positive. Yes Australia has some down sides. But don’t fool yourself, the UK has its share of down sides too. And if you don’t like it, just leave. No shame in it, no need to make excuses. You didn’t like it, and you went home. No need to write endlessly about how bad you think Australia is.

On balance, Australia has been good to me, despite the cost. I would do it all again.

gmralston

I good read, thanks for posting

Sally Simpson

What a great post & some good advice too!

There are many of us on BE who are happy here & equally like the UK, I think we just get lost in the arguments/ether sometimes!

moneypenny20

Great post, thanks for that. It can seem that you're not allowed to love both and if you say you do, you're accused of all sorts. It's a shame but being comfortable and happy doesn't make good discussion, people sometimes just want to argue for the sake of it. Don't worry about it.

slapphead_otool

I guess my point was lost somewhat in the background details. I didn’t plan on going to Australia. I was sent (rather unwillingly). I had no misconceptions, no prior ideas of some idyllic life. I just got off the plane and started work. And the frantic haze of work stopped me thinking about things until that night in the Plough, when I saw the Icehouse video.
So my point really is don’t sit in the UK thinking about how wonderful Australia must be. Because when you arrive you will find it isn’t utopia. Its just another country.

And don’t sit bitching when you are here because it isn’t perfect. No one ever told you it was. If you are disappointed, then its your expectations that haven’t been met. Rather than moan, work like I did, see the country, meet the people, make the most of the experience.

We live an average 22,000 days. To waste one dreaming about Australia, or moaning about it, is such a waste of a precious commodity.


PS – every migrant here takes up a precious visa. I know many many people in Asia, especially Thailand and Indonesia, who would sell themselves into slavery for a chance to get such a visa. I don’t think I could tell them that some people get a visa, then go home because they don’t like the radio channels.

blackcountrygirl

Well said Slaphead we`ve been here almost 20yrs, and yes we would do it all again too,, we`ve taken the good with the bad, but I must say mostly good, don`t regret it for one minute

Wendy66

REALLY enjoyed reading that, top post - wish you all the best for the next 25 years

Vash the Stampede

Cracking good post; very well said and very well expressed.

Loved your mini autobiography too.

slapphead_otool

For those who never saw the Red Rattlers, , this is the classic, boneshaking mainstay of Sydney Rail until 1992 when they were taken out of service after an incredible 66 years on the rails.

“After numerous fatal accidents, with people falling out of the doors….”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4tVbc56Q0E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1Afn5bRb98

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVqZ2aglowE

I still miss them…. That feeling of relief when you got to your station without being pushed out of those open doors.

Paula Cox

Hi

Really enjoyed your post.

Paula

ChuiRafiki

Well said. Enjoy the next 25 years!

Migrant8

Hi,
Very nice productive post.Really good.

thejohnhagen

I enjoyed reading your post. as you mentioned I am one of those many who just started to live for a change. And I can feel the seasons you spent in Australia by your post.
and its true your life is what you want it to be.
People change and evolve with the passage of time. We learn things then unlearn some of those and then re-learn them in new ways.
Life's short - no regrets - relish the moments - move on..

slapphead_otool

Forgiving on ANZAC Day (a bit more of my story…)

A one stage I joined the army, following a family tradition. Went to Duntroon, passed out on that hated parade ground. Enjoyed the time, the comradeship, the new sights and experiences. Lot of British in the Australian Army at that time, I guess its our martial background. The Mess often sounded like a British Regional Accent Society AGM.

One year my CO decided we would march as a Regiment in the Sydney ANZAC Day parade. We spent the night before getting ready, got up at 3am and did a dawn service. Freezing cold in summer uniform of short sleeved shirts. The Padre passed around a bottle of rum to shop us shivering.
Very moving dawn service. Big lump in my throat at the Last Post. Ghosts on the parade square.

After the Dawn Service we had the traditional “gunfire breakfast”, coffee with lots of rum, then into the city on trucks. Formed up on a side street. Lots of waiting and hanging around. Saw lots of old friends. Then the CO yelled, we formed up and moved off.

Platoon by Platoon, Company by Company, the Regimental Pipes and Drums playing as the entire Regiment marched in perfect order down George Street, my fathers old Wilkinson in my hand. I glanced back out the corner of my eye as we made the turn off George onto Bathurst, and we looked damn good. I felt proud.

My girlfriend was waiting at Hyde Park. She was terrified. The Japanese in Sydney were always advised to stay indoors on ANZAC day. I was having none of that, and ordered her to watch me march and meet me after.

The Regiment split up and filled the bars. The CO, bored with the canned music, ordered one of the Sergeants to find the pipes and drums, and get them to play in the bar. The noise was deafening, drums and bagpipes shook the building. But it felt good. They were our pipes and drums, and we were immensely proud of them. My girlfriend was impressed and amazed.

Later we walked into another bar. As I was getting a drink an old veteran went up to my girlfriend and asked her where she came from. I saw his medals. Pacific Star, he had fought the Japanese.

She told him she was from Japan, and he paused, and then quietly said “long ago your grandfather and I tried to kill each other. I hope your Grandfather survived”.

He spoke some Japanese. He had learned it as a prisoner. I assume he had suffered at the hands of the Japanese, and it must have been hard for him, but he sat and chatted to my girlfriend without any hint of malice. She said he was a nice old man.

That night, as I lay in bed I thought over the events of the day. The Regiment marching, the pipes and drums, the bars.

But the highlight of the day was an old Australian who could justifiably have shunned my girlfriend, or even abused her, and I would have had no defence. Instead he acted like a man, and a gentleman.

Sometimes our greatest action can be to forgive and move on.

Vash the Stampede

Inspirational!