cheeryo1

I am an Australian that lived in the UK for three years on a work permit.
Last year the UK increased the period one had to wait for UK citizenship to 6(!!!) years-unlike Australia the home office in their infinite wisdom and sublime understanding of how to attract quality immigrants, didnt exempt people already waiting it out in the UK.
This effectively dashed my hopes of becoming British(couldnt hack my job for that much longer).
I returned to Australia a little bitter-however-I had a home in the Blue mountains to come back to. Within hours of getting of the plane in Sydney, I started thinking this place aint too bad-within days I began wondering what I ever liked about the UK-four months later I feel the same. Since then I recieved EU citizenship-I wont bother using it(except to travel).
The things I didnt like about Oz are all still here -the isolation, the parochialism, lack of history, the Bland British derived working-class culture-and yet its all OK-I will take it over the heaving crowds of the UK and Europe anyday.
I only regret ever leaving.
To people like Arkon-I suspect your mind is playing tricks on you-to hell with the better TV, better shopping-you might be forgeting the myriad of irritations in the UK-in Oz the worst that can happen is you will be bored-Australia has three things the Uk doesnt-
1.Space
2.Space
3.Space

chels

Nego's???????????

The rest of the post????

It's Monday morning, maybe this is why it doesn't make any sense to me? Maybe I should go home and get a few more hours sleep.

cheeryo1

I meant those negative about Australia-I was merely saying that I came back to Oz reluctantly and yet realised on arriving how much I prefer it to life in the UK.
Some may say thats because I am Australian-I am not so sure.
I suspect many people here are forgetting why they left the UK and on their return might soon remember.

iPom

Hello

Where in the BM's are you? I love it here... absolutely love it.

Bix

Time is a healer.
Time fades the reality.
Time papers over the cracks.

Today is where we live.

cheeryo1

I am in Leura, It was when I hit the mountains that I began wondering why I left-I love Europe, but the tranquility here is amazing, its paradise-and the towns are "England without the bad bits"(OK I know there are some ferals in Katoomba-but they are pretty tame)

chels

Remember what?

iPom

Well they're fairly tame apart from the guys who beat that other guy up a few months back, who then had to be airlifted to hospital ... He'd been stabbed multiple times. But yes, Katoomba isn't bad at all. I like everyone feral or not. They seem to be mostly nice people... just different, which I like.

I'm just down the road from you in W'Falls. My children are at Korowal.

cheeryo1

Why they left the UK-the things that made them want to get out of the place.
Here in the Blue Mountains it is unbelievably quite-very little traffic, no queues at petrol pumps-cute cafes-with cheery staff(mostly).
It in many ways mirrors the area in the UK I lived in-but an ideal version-without the social problems-and for those that find "foreigners" irritating(I am a "foreigner" myself-can I make this point??)-this place is a dream-hardly a non-white face on the street-all very polite quite anglo-celtic small-town middle-class-kind of like a lost world. Kind of what daily-mail readers wish England was "still"-yet it makes for a very good place to live.

cheeryo1

Is ita good school?

northernbird

[QUOTE=cheeryo1]this place is a dream-hardly a non-white face on the streetQUOTE]


asking for trouble with that statement.

iPom

It's superb... couldn't fault it. Children are just in their element. Brilliant teaching. Really everything it's advertised as.

chels

[QUOTE=northernbird] My trollometer isn't working very well (hasn't woken up yet) but those comments registered on it

northernbird

[QUOTE=chels] trollometer, bloody excellent

thebears

[QUOTE=northernbird] Aye there be a few red faced brits storming over to sort them out.