Pants

Cars are just a means to an end, they are to get from A to B

ohhh yes and they just eat away at your bank balance....I feel like giving my cheque book to my mechanic, he seems to get more use of it than me..!!!
230 quid yesterday to get my electric window done..!!( it needed a whole new piece.!)

MrsB

"Living in Australia" is eating away at our bank balance at the moment!!! And the cost of utilities is shocking!!

How I wish I had a cheque book, I'm looking forward to writing one at Christmas though!!!

Pants

Not long hunny.....mind you cost of living here is hard for us!!

Lynne

SUV = Sport Utility Vehicle. Cars like Ford Explorers and Expeditions come into this category. I sometimes wonder how they define some of these categories. I used to have a GMC Jimmy which I thought was an SUV but according to GMC its a truck. Now I have a Dodge Durango and according to Dodge that is a truck. I would have liked a smaller vehicle from a gas point of view but I need a large carrying capacity since I am always carrying around two sets of adult ice hockey equipment and you ain't going to get all that in a Ford Taurus.

Here in Huntsville we have an abundance of very large 4x4's being driven by career mums., Excursions seem to be the "in" thing right now. I guess they feel they need something big to cut you up when they lose concentration because they are talking on the phone, or maybe its a sense of security when we have that 1/8 inch of snow in the winter. lolol

BLC

Nearly two years back after a long stint in Oz, it is VERY expensive here in the UK, harder to if you came back with limited funds and you don't have a kind and generous family to help.

Good luck

Always21

LOL! Thank you for confirming I've made the right decision to get back home and not raise my kids here! On another message board (about cities and land use patterns) somebody had posted a photo of two kids driving in one of those electric toy cars on a street in a McMansion development with no sidewalks. Perfectly innocent but to me it was the scariest thing!

eurotramp

Hi Kendodd,

may I ask you...what made you go over in the first place and why do go want to come back??

callé

lol. yes sports utility vehicle. Big giant things commonly on big giant wheels and the drivers think they own the road. even if you are going above the speed limit they sit right on your tail until you move. I ride my brakes when they do this. annoying arrogant buggars!

flashman

Right on. It means "Sports Utility Vehicle" with 4 wheel drive and off road capability. Like an army Jeep but with better seats and nicer colour. THe Yuppies are the main customers but the only off road they encounter is in the Walmart parking lot.

MrsB

We came just for an "adventure", to do something different whilst we could, and to test the waters as to whether it really is "a better life", a "better standard of living". The intention was to do 2 years and then decide.

We never left the UK because we didn't like it, or because of crime, drugs, etc etc. All those things are here too.

Once you have spent time out of your country, it really does make you realise what you had, it puts your life's perspectives all in order for you.

I was horribly homesick for 3 months, lost 2 or 3 stone in weight because I physically couldn't eat. Avoided the anti-depressants though.

There are lots and lots and lots of reasons I want to return, but I'm not going to post them on here, because soemone will come along and slate me for it, but the main reason has got to be family, and friendships which have taken 5, 10, 20 30 years to build up.

If you want to know the rest send me a pm!

In the meantime, I'm just getting on with it, and seeing the glass as half full and not half empty!!! I feel like "life is on hold" at the moment.

MrsB

And before anyone comes along and says "but you must of known about family before you left".....

yes I did, but you can't know how you are going to feel, until you are actually living 12,000 miles away from them, and they can't pop over and babysit, whilst you pop to Paris for the weekend!!!!

Always21

I know what you mean about life being on hold. The trouble is everyone around me expects life to go on and I have to keep working, when all I can think about is leaving! I'm actually having trouble seeing the glass as half full at the moment. I need to go on one of my photo tours downtown to shake myself out of it. The only problem is last time I did that I ended up crying about the thought of leaving the place!!

Always21

Exactly. You convince yourself that you will cope with it and that the ocassional visit will suffice. Life with kids is so much harder with only one side of the family around (especially when they're not much help anyway).

Squirrel

Everybody is different and it would be a boring world if we were all the same. I could have moved to the US with my USC husband, but I prefered to have him move in with me in London. I'm not that materialistic TBH and neither is he. SIL has a bigger appartment in MA, BUT it's rented and our small one bed flat is mortgaged, only 14 years to go (we don't want kids so we don't see why we should buy a house and struggle to pay a much bigger mortgage). If we lived in the US we'd be working much more, less holiday time and not such cool places to go when we did get time off. Here in london, we go abroad at least 6 times a year including to France, US, Scotland and other places in Europe. Hubby usually gets back to Boston 3 times a year--I can't image me getting back to the UK that often if I only had 2 weeks vacation! I really couldn't be bothered with filling in forms every time I went to the doctors (I'm a bit of a hypercondriac!) and frankly, the thought of having my health care depend on my job scares me.

Being near all London has to offer, my mum, the equivilant of 8 weeks holiday and proximity to Europe are what I want, not a big house. I like pubs, British TV, not having to do a tax return, not getting carded, temperate weather, public transport (don't drive and no desire to learn). My most important posessions are my photos, not anything expensive.

I don't fault anyone who wants a big house and car and a swimming pool. Go for it! It's your choice. We all have to live our lives how we want them, never mind what others think of our choices.

Englishmum

Now if anyone has time to sit down with a mug of tea, here's a lovely long thread (which runs to six pages!) of the good things American expats living in the UK have to say about why they're enjoying living in Blighty:

http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=3338.0

It's quite heart-warming. I don't think anyone who wants to live in the UK is bonkers at all. You only need to read the current thread on the US forum on this website here about the problems expats are having with their medical billing to realise just how wonderful it is in the UK never, ever having to worry about paying for medical fees.