Clairep

My husband and I are seriously considering emigrating to Australia in the next 2-3 years (we're both 28 and have jobs which fit into the current skills list) but I'd like to find out from those of you that have done what its really like living out there (we've only visited for holidays a few weeks at a time).

Is the lifestyle really that much better than the UK and is it a better place to bring up your family?

All comments welcome,

Rgds
Claire

MAB!

...Ask Pommie Bastard!!!:scared:

millertime

Definately!!

We are about the same age as you and were over for a working holiday last year. We toured and stopped off and worked. We lived in Manly for 3 mths and then on the Sunshine Coast for 3 mths.
We lived in a communal house in Manly but deliberately rented our own unit on the sunshine coast to see if we could live alone without others and live 'normally'!

It was just the best and given half the chance we would be there now and not back here!
The lifestyle was top class - outdoors!, people so friendly and families looked happy and healthy to us!

An example....at home we come home from work and go to the gym, have tea and sit in front of TV watching crap on TV....over there we came home from work, had a run down the beach and then headed for one of the beach barbis to cook tea and have a beer and chat about our days at work...which would you prefer?!

Herman

For us there are positives and negatives.
Work life here is just as demanding as in the UK and actually the culture in many corporates is more American, ie. longer hours expected and incredibly demanding bosses. We also find as employees we are treated worse than in the UK in many aspects - worse pay, less holiday, only 8 days paid sick leave, a manufactured class system between the management and the workers etc. I could go on. I dont want to exaggerate this too much, I mean I have made some good friends at work and once the initial shock caused by the differences passes you get used to working here. One thing I would say - its fairly demoralising commuting in sweltering heat every day, sitting in an office looking at the great weather outside, then travelling home in the heat again and its dark by the time you've got your suit off. Yes nice weather is a bonus, but unless you are lucky enough to be out of the rat race and able to lounge in the sea or by a pool, the heat becomes more of an annoyance.
We dont have kids here so I'm in no position to comment from personal experience. Other expats I know here who have kids tell me that again there are pluses and minuses. People are generally family orientated here and kids seem to have a decent life, with a strong emphasis on sports. However, for expats there's the penalty of distance from the rest of the family.
On Monday my wife and I took the day off and I have to say, as a couple about to return to the UK and planning to start a family, we watched the young mums having picnics in the sun on the beach and swimming in the warm sea with their toddlers at Shelley Beach (Manly, Sydney) with envy. This was the first time we've been to the beach on a weekday since we arrived 2 years ago and I think for the very first time my wife finally "got it" and felt slight pangs of regret about our decision to return to the UK. She has never ever expressed any remourse, quite the opposite in fact, until Monday afternoon. She admitted that it looked like the dream place for a non-working mum to raise young kids.
Other than that we find life here not much different to the UK. We work, we grocery shop, we eat, we sleep, we clean, we cook, we have bills to pay, we meet friends, we go to the gym, we relax in front of the TV of an evening with a glass of red after a hard day in the office. Life goes on as usual.
Weekends here were full of excitement and adventure for the first year. Now I have to admit that we find our weekends here rather dull and lifeless. We've seen all we want to see. We've done all the hikes/cycling trails/camping trips/weekends away that we wanted to and things we do now are merely things we've done before. Once the buzz of pastures new passes its a bit of an anticlimax and the very size of Australia means that your world actually shrinks. People who have been here a while will know exactly what I mean by that.
So, on balance I would say that living in Sydney is pretty dam good. Of course there are negatives but for the hundreds of thousands of expats who stay here, clearly the positives outweigh them. That said, our personal preference is to return. We had a pretty dam good life in the UK too and we miss our family and friends, I miss having a rewarding and rewarded job, we miss Britain and Europe. I do think that for every couple like us who want to return, we probably meet two couples who want to stay!

jah4reds

Hi Claire

[Great post again Herman - gives a good viewpoint from a Brit (and Czech) in Aus.]

I work in Brisbane and have certainly found the pace of life at home and work much slower than the UK. The bosses are less demanding (and less efficient' in their work practices), but the pay is lower. I think the cost of living has already been debated in other posts in great detail - I work as a 'white-collar' worker in IT and can confirm that it doesn't pay as well as the UK.

The heat is greater in Brisbane than in most other capital cities, but still I only find a few isolated days a year when I find the heat overbearing. Air-conditioning is prevalent at work (for white-collar workers) and I often go outside during the day to warm up! (Strange but true)

I have 2 small children so being so far away from relatives is probably the worst aspect of living here (for us anyway). Telephone, Chat, Web-phones are a poor substitute for human contact. Still the relaxed way of life (for us) still outways the negatives. There always seem to a huge range of actvities/facilities for children and as our lives virtually revolve around them - we don't find the activtities/facilities in and around Brisbane lacking at all. When they grow up and start doing their 'own thing' we might feel there isn't enough to keep us 'adults' entertained. For now the constant warmth, larger houses, beach life, pool life, outdoors whilst being sunsafe (in parks, back yards, etc) all while the sun is shining is a big plus for us and our 2 small kids.

So far we have been here for 4+ years and are still discovering new places to explore so we are not bored. After a slow start, we have made many Australian friends - mostly through the children. We still miss the good things about UK we left behind - like friends, relatives, cold frosty mornings, snow, good pubs, (and for my wife) shopping - and every year we evaluate if we think it's better to stay or return to the UK. So far each year Aus has won because of it's 'lifestyle' suits us. We have the attitude that we are lucky to be living here and able to return to the UK whenever we wish. So if the UK starts to seem a more attractive place to live we will 'up sticks' and return without any regrets - although this plan may get a little more tricker as the kids get older and are more settled in school with friends, etc.

Good luck with your decision,
AndyH
Brisbane

pommie bastard

You had some good answers and honest ones , but in the end no ones life is just the same as some one elses and what your job is where you live , what you earn varies in Australia as anywhere else.
You will have to work as hard here as in the UK and take care of your family just the same ,you make your lifestyle not the country you live in.

Inked

You are both lucky enough to be young enough to get a visa that will allow you to live and work in Australia for a year, working 3 months at a time for different employers. Its a great way to get a feel for the place and a good way to supplement an investigative long holiday. You really can’t get a feel for a place without actually living there in my opinion. You need to be in a place long enough to start doing everyday ordinary things rather than holiday stuff. This type of visa option is quick to get and allows you to gain useful experience of Aussie life. I'd recommend it to you. A consequence is that you may also find an employer that's so content with your work that they will sponsor you for the residency. If a year our of work is too much, try for 6 months.

joe