Hipster Contrarian

This is a question particularly for people on the West Coast, but I'm really interested in everybody's views. A comment on the Australia board got me thinking about something, as the poster mentioned that one thing they found very hard about moving was the time difference. They said that they found it very hard that when they were just going to bed, "the rest of the world" (i.e. the place they had left) was just getting up to start their day. Apparently it got to them more than they had thought it would.

Obviously Canada is the other way round, but has anybody who has emigrated there found it hard to adjust to no longer being on GMT (if you were)? What about at times like New Year and Christmas, when friends and family are 5-8 hours ahead of you? Does it matter, or do you not give it a second thought?

I would be interested to hear your opinions!

TruBrit

nahhh to be honest that's the least of me worries....never even thought about it....

tallperson

Personally for me it hasn't been a problem!

You have to remember to make any business calls to the UK in the morning but even that is less important as call centres are open to 8pm.

Means I can speak to my Mum and sister more than once in the day as well

R2D2

Again..Nah
Not been an issue
I'm at home during the day, so can speak to people back home until late afternoon. After that Hub is home to talk to, so no lack of conversation.

Rich_007

Not at all....

Living on the west coast is like living on the edge of the known universe we love the fact that we are in a different third segment (8 hours out of 24) of the day than the UK and a different time zone to the rest of Canada ....it makes one appreciate the vastness of this fascinating nation.

Time difference re. contact bods in the UK is a bit hit and miss but that's no real hassle as viocemail email and whatever all work fine. Weekends are always best time for a yak.

Medically, psychologically, sleep wise, etc no impact from the time difference factor.

Rich.

Calgal

Wasn't a problem for me to adjust after a couple of days when we first arrived - the worst part was trying to get the kids to stay asleep at night, they were up wanting to play at 2am

But not a problem since - just have to remember timing when making calls back home - or more importantly, making sure THEY remember and don't wake you up in the middle of the night! NOT very funny!

willmore

Think of it this way...if you live on the west coast you get to celebrate news year several times before its actually midnight where you live!

Grah

its brilliant, 6 hours here means Saturday I get 3 Live soccer games on the telly before I even have to go shopping.

The only thing that may be a problem is if you have to keep in daily contact.

As the kids come home 3-4 they check emails and reply to Nan they some times even MSN as 9-10 is when she is home from bingo.

Also gives you chance for TWO birthday Nights out English one then a Canadian one.

Atlantic Xpat

Not a problem for me as NL time is UK-3.5hrs. And its a unique timezone too, that half and hour really confuses folk! Useful for talking to folks back home uptil 8pmish at night (11.30pm their time). Not so useful when you want to watch TV progs that are on say 10pm EST which is 11.30pm here. Timeshifting benefits from cable dont really work here so I'm trying to convince Mrs AX that we need a PVR!

Judy in Calgary

First of all, time differences have not bothered me, regardless of where I've lived.

Secondly, to the extent that I cared about time differences at all, I found Australia's time zone a good one in which to live. Australia is ahead of most of the rest of the world. If I forgot an overseas family member's birthday, and then remembered half way through the day, I still had a few hours in which to phone them and remedy the situation.

During the long periods in which I've lived in North America's Mountain Time Zone and several of my family members have stayed behind in Southern Africa (GMT +2), I've had to be more on the ball.

Again, we're so used to the time difference and working around it, that we barely think about it. We phone our South African family members the night before their birthdays, when it's the morning of their birthdays in their time zone. We phone them on our Christmas Eve to reach them on their Christmas Morning.

I sympathise with the person whose post you referenced. When it comes to culture shock, you never know in advance which quirky little detail will get to you. I must say that being bothered by the time zone difference is a new one to me.

In my experience the inconveniences associated with splitting a family between the northern and southern hemispheres are more significant than the ones associated with splitting a family between the eastern and western hemispheres. A fairly significant north-south hurdle is the fact that the seasons are out of synch with each other, and it's more difficult to arrange vacations (holidays) at times that suit everyone (especially when children's school vacations are involved).

Helen Parnell

I live in Cochrane which is MT. and the time change has never bothered me until the New Year and my relatives could not be bothered to phone me at their new year (5pm for me) and so, I did phone them at my new year and woke them all up at 7am. Funny they have not made the same mistake twice.

hot wasabi peas

I prefer being in the Pacific time zone. I feel like I get to stay up and sleep in later than the most of the world. Childish thinking but hey.