sssss

Really undecided as to whether to go for the job I have been offered in OZ.
I read on here about ping pongers, people who dont settle there and wish they could come home, people who have the curse of the ex pat and dont settle when they come home and obviously people who love it!

Just so undecided! I dont go along with the whole sun thing and want real answers!

- Spiders - whats the reality of life down under with them, even with a house sprayed.

- crime - standard of living - what is it really like? Better than the uk? (in south australia)

- kids - we dont have them yet but is it really 'better to bring them up here'

- lifestyle - lots of people moaning that oz is boring which is worrying!

I know its how long is a peice of string but real/honest answers would be great.

I am unsure whether to simply go and live in the countryside instead of the city and stay in the uk.

Thanks!

Wendy

Life's what you make it, wherever you are.

All your questions are really subjective, so are pretty hard to answer. Everyone has a different view, and any answers you get will be views and not reality for everyone.

But hey, I'll play along and answer the questions based on my experiences/thoughts.

Spiders - Haven't had any in my rental this year. I do have a Raid Automatic spray in the kitchen though I have had a lot of centipede type things! (don't know what they are but there's 100's of them!!)

- crime - standard of living - what is it really like? Better than the uk? (in south australia) - I'm in South Australia. There's crime here. You do get some pretty bad stuff happening. Drugs and gun crime can be pretty bad. Mostly amongst the bikers. There's been quite a few robberies at petrol stations lately. But after saying that, I feel a lot safer here than I ever did in the UK - but then I do come from Bradford

kids - we dont have them yet but is it really 'better to bring them up here'. Mine like it here and wouldn't go back to the UK. Whether it's better or not I don't know, have been here 5 years and the UK has changed a lot. I do know that most of my cousins kids can't get work. My eldest two have good jobs here. I do think they stay kids here longer though. Based on comparing my 12 year old daughter to my cousins 11 year old (who acts 14!)

- lifestyle lots of people moaning that oz is boring which is worrying! Only boring people are bored Plenty to do here if you look for it. Really depends what you like though!?

Jensanco

Hope that helps

itxrd

Do a search. That'll help.

Have answered above

Sherlock Holmes

Here's a copy of a post I made in another thread. I'll place the thread link at the end. You'll see a great deal of debate (and other stuff ) in there:

In all these discussions of income, cost of living, what the weather is like etc. etc. etc., of course there are those who say this or that income will be fine (or not) the weather is fantastic (or not) quality of things is fine (or not). Open debate is useful of course but the one thing that will make or break a move from the UK to Oz is: Will you be mentally better off?

Since I moved here the weather has been fantastic and terrible.

My income went up - and down

The cost of living has gone up - we have made adjustments.

But am I HAPPY? Yes.

Why am I happy? Because I find that here nobody judges you.

If you are happy somewhere you will manage. If you aren't happy it can be a nightmare.

The Australian way of life has plenty of quirks. There are several annoyances of which most posters on B.E. will be aware. There are plenty of plus points too.

On any income, either Australia will suit you or it won't. The snag is, you don't find out until you get here.

Taken from: http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=725301

Still Game

Please don't base a huge life changing event around wee beasties!

I think if you can afford to make the move, won't be worse off financially and can handle being away from family and friends, then go for it.

Do your sums and your research carefully. Look at the positives and if they outweigh the negatives what have you go to lose. If it doesn't work out, then at least you gave it a shot.

quoll

It is indeed one of those piece of string type questions.

Spiders - yes, there are spiders in Australia and some of them will love to share your house. Usually the big harmless huntsmen like to come inside and occasionally you will find white tails (nasty bites but not killers) - redbacks like the woodpiles so be careful if you have a wood heater. You can get your house sprayed but whether you like living in an environment that kills things is another matter. The chances of getting killed by a spider bite are really rare but some of them can hurt a bit and make you feel a bit woozy. I find cockroaches more of a menace and they can be very hard to eradicate and if you get ants in the kitchen then they can be hard to get rid of as well.

Crime - yes, we have it here too. No riots at the moment but it probably wont be long. Fair bit of drug warfare, some postcode gangs and quite a bit more gun crime I suspect (we are veering towards the US gangsta more than the Midsomer murderer)

Kids - not an inherently better place to bring up kids, just different. What they make up for in beaches they miss out in other ways - history, culture (blah blah, yes I know Aus has both but it really isnt the same!), isolation because of lack of connection with extended family etc. You may even find that they head off themselves once they get old enough (one of mine went on a gap year almost a decade ago and hasnt bothered to come back - better opportunities in UK!). Youth suicide rates here, whilst on the decline, are at the top of the world rankings and youth mental health is big business. We have youth unemployment here too and many young people will never get a foot on the property ladder just like UK

Lifestyle - mine is distinctly less fulfilled here but, then, I dont much like sitting on beaches getting burned to a crisp every day of the year. Sadly, I now find that most of my life is spent on the computer as I pursue my hobbies or otherwise inside trying to keep warm/escape from the heat/avoid the flies. The older I get the more difficult it becomes to cope with the heat

Every one is different though - if you have an itch for adventure then by all means go ahead and scratch it. We took the opportunities that came our way, but then we failed to continue to make judgments about where we wanted our lives to go when we were heads down working to survive, raising kids, preparing for retirement etc We neglected to move on to the next adventure and just got stuck in some sort of comfort zone (limbo really) and then there are all sorts of other things that come into play - the kids education not being at the right stage, financially strapped with the dollar/pound exchange, the arrival of grandkids, etc.

Good luck with your decision, only you can make it!

Bermudashorts

My tuppence:

Spiders - seen no more spiders here than I ever did at home. We have just had one huntsman in the house but it minded its own business on the ceiling (we have very high ceilings) and a couple of days later when it came down the cat got it.

Crime - I have never been personally impacted by crime in 40 years in the UK and I have not been impacted by crime in my 1 year in Australia. I feel no more and no less at risk here than I did there.

Standard of living - again I enjoy a very similar standard of living

Children - we don't have them either, but they do seem very nice here. Very well mannered, well behaved and even groups of teenagers are courteous and not at all intimidating like Uk counterparts can be. I don't agree that one first world country is better for children than another but we are both very impressed with the quality of children here.

Lifestyle - we are not at all bored here, we are a bus ride from Sydney centre though, I suppose there are places that could get boring.

Overall we are very happy.

KJCherokee

The only spiders you need to worry about in SA are redbacks - you don't usually find these inside the house but they are likely to make their home in dark undisturbed corners of sheds. Having said that I doubt if I saw more than half a dozen in all the time (16 years) that I lived in SA. Millipedes used to be a problem - not sure what that's like these days since they tried a biological eradication program.

Judging by reports from the UK in the last few days, Australia is a far safer place to live! Australia has the same problems as any other developed nation, but on the theory that crime rates are related to unemployment Australia has a better position (5.5%) than the UK (7.9%)(2010 figures). There are certainly areas in SA where I would feel slightly nervous going alone after dark, but in general Australia is as safe or safer than the UK.

Standard of living? Depends on what you want and how much income you have, just like anywhere else.

No idea, as we brought our kids out here at 5 & 3 so don't know much about bringing up kids in the UK. But I now have 5 grandkids so being out here obviously didn't harm them!

Lifestyle is what you make it - but if you like fresh air and sunshine and wide open spaces then Australia can offer you a lot more of each than the UK can. If your idea of lifestyle is staying indoors watching TV and going out to nightclubs then stay in the UK.

As previous posters have said, make a list of the reasons you might want to emigrate and the reasons for staying in the UK and decide which has the greatest appeal - and if you decide to come here do so with a positive attitude of looking for the best Australia has to offer. Australia isn't England, and if you are continually looking for English things when you are here and whinging when you don't find them you will never be happy. If you come here you need to look for the things that make Australia a great place to live, not the things that (in your mind) are better in the UK.

In Exile

If this is top of your list then either your priorities are well out of allignment or you really have nothing to worry about.

There's criminals and jails here too you know. As with anywhere there are places to go and places not to go, but dont be fooled into thinking Australia is some kind of utopia where there's hardly any crime. If you go looking, I'm sure you will find it easily enough.


in my opinion no it isnt any better or any worse. Its what you make of it. People whinge about how the weather in the UK prevents an outdoor lifestyle, but you could argue the same thing here too. For months of the year in Sydney it gets really hot and muggy. You have to ensure that kids are wearing hats, regulalrly smothered in sun cream, limit their exposure etc. The sun here is ferocious. The difference between standing in direct sun and standing in the shade in summer is usually quite a few degrees. Somethng about there being **** all ozone layer.

My wife is Australian and she recalls spending entire days down at the beach as a kid in the 80s. It was only at the end of the day that she would get that 'toasty and time to go inside' feeling. She reckons she gets that in about 20 minutes now.

Just because the sun shines doesnt mean everything is automatically well and good.

I also find there are less places to take them for things to do, and at the end of the day it seems to gravitate around meeting up with other parents in a park or the beach or at someones house while the kids play.
Its obviously subjective but I'd much prefer to take my kids to things like castles, ruins, historical sites and at least have a point to going somewhere.

Remember that people, yourself included, have grown up in the UK, and have turned out fine (I'm making an assumption there!). The country is equipped to deal with the climate. Same as here. Just dont believe that Australia is some kind of holy grail for parenting. Its really not. If people whinge about the UK climate being bad, how do you think the Canadians feel. I personally dont hear that much complaining from the ones I know.

Anyway, at the end of the day its you bringing them up not the country.

Depends on what you want to do really. I find there are things 'missing' like old buildings, cities, architecture and evetrything is really far apart. But on the flip side, if I went diving from London I would likely see rubber johnnys, shopping trolleys and corpses, yet from Sydney you can literally walk in to the sea and have a colourful, clear fascinating world - and the water is warmer too.

Personally I find I do get more bored here than I did in the UK though, and I put that down to geographical isolation. I live in central syndey and I've done most day trip journeys multiple times (hunter valley, kangaroo valley, blue mountains, inner city distractions, etc). Its hard to just 'escape' for the day.

In my current mindset, having possibly watched one too many 'Escape to the Country' on Friday night, my option would be to move back to the UK and settle out of a city somewhere. My job requires me to be near major cities, so living in the country in Australia just isnt practical, wheras in the UK you can live from any number of major cities. The public transportation is not decent enough in my opinion, and the cities are too sprawled and very far apart.

Have you ever been here before? That may be a starting point you know.

In Exile

LOL. sorry, but what a generalised point!

Just because the sun shines in australia you think people arent sat at home watching crap on the TV! Wide open spaces available in both places, fresh air available in both places.
Going to nightclubs: Maybe get with the times a little, that happens all over the world. Or have you not experienced any major global city on Thursday Friday and Satrudays? Thats related to demographics not geographical location thing.

You should also probably mention the "football hooligans" and the "beer louts" in the UK too, just to drive your point home.

Turban Explorer

I loathe the phrase 'only boring people get bored' - it's trite and untrue.

Australia for me represents wildlife, flora and fauna and the ocean. That's the reason we are here. The outdoorsy life is definitely somewhat agreeable.

No where's perfect but the downsides I find are - it's a bit culturally backward (where I am obviously), its a youthful country so doesn't have a long history so can feel quite one dimensional, the people are generally very friendly but I don't find many people interested in depthy conversations/banter and debate. For these things I always feel a bit alienated and homesick. If you're anything like me you will find it a little bland from time to time.

If the finance side isn't an imperative I'd view it as an adventure and come over for a few years. You don't have to stay.

Wendy

Did your Mum never say that to you!? Mine did ALL the time

Weebie

BWAHAHAHHAHAHHAAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHHAHAA HAHAAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHHAA. People here DO judge you and regard you as a complete and utter piece of shit if in Melbourne you are not in the inner bay area (frankston si regarded as trash). It does affect your way of life here if you assimilate with the locals.

Turban Explorer

Yes. When my scalectrix was getting packed away and I was told to go to my room and read a book! I associate it with bad things