Ian12

I liked the polls. They provide a good snap shot of where people are, albeit a limited survey. It is thought provoking. I am not seriously thinking of returnimg to the UK (Yet). We have only been here in Sidney 4 months. It still feels like a holiday and that's part of the problem. Our (adopted) kids are on bridging visas while the Dept of Immigration sort out health checks, my partner who is Australian and trained in Australia but worked for the last 17 years as chartered accountant in London has been unable to find work here. He is being told that most companies want someone with recent Australian experience. How different can account managing be? I find myself gradually drifting back to my former profession (which was never my first option) but it seems that it may be quicker for me to get an income than my partner. We live in a lovely bit of suburbia which is ideal for two children 8 and 7. I love the space, the trees, the closeness of beaches, BUT as a same sex couple I can't see that we have been overwhelmed by neighbourliness. Maybe it's nothing to do with being a same sex couple - who knows - maybe suburbia is like this for everyone? Despite being pretty outgoing and sociable Australia (or at least the bit we are in) is not the laid back "have a tinny and a chat" place I thought it would be. In fact my old stopming ground around Harley Street in London was more sociable. So I guess this stream of consciousnes about moving back was prompted by the poll. I hope I have not bored you all ridged!

scoobydoo

Not at all bored! I like reading everyones storys too.

Regarding the "neighbourliness" - I don't think that it is anything personal. We have lived in our road for nearly a year now and have only managed to strike up conversation with one neighbour, and they are from the UK! As you are, we are friendly and chatty people....I think it is a common suburban trait here to not actualy be seen or speak to neighbours!!!!

Hope you settle soon...I think it takes a while.

Taffia

Some folks may have read the few posts I've written. As I said I was lucky & had 7 yrs in the MN. I got around. The US, Oz, Canada, & many others, 30 total. So I've seen quite a cross section of the World.
Oz & Canada were enticing to me, & I figured when I went ashore, I would settle for somewhere other than Wales.
I was usually away a year, more or less. Each time I went home on leave the country seemed smaller, & less appealing, my mates were either away at sea, or had new friends. The months I spent at home were enjoyable, but I was always glad to get back to sea.
My apprenticeship was as a fitter & turner at a ship repair yard.
I spent 2 yrs. with 5 weeks on the Spanish coast, & in Portugal, so I was reasonably fluent in both languages.
When I was ready, it was a flip of a coin between Brazil, where machinists with English, & a grasp of Portuguese could make really good money, but Canada ended up being my choice.
Working ashore was a huge step, & the first year I was homesick, but when I analysed it, I was better off here, money-wise & freedom to work at whatever job I was equipped for,(in the UK one was pretty well stuck in the same job),so life was interesting.
I don't intend to bore anyone ,so suffice it to say my 45 yrs have been mainly content. I didn't go back until '87, for a month, in the Spring. Real nice. then in 2000 my niece & family were emigrating to Queensland.I wet to Wales & spent Xmas & New Years with them. They love it there.
What I'm trying to get across, is onceyou've made your choice, stick it out.You'll soon fit in. Too many folks head for ex-pat clubs to make friends. I find you
get accepted much quicker when you integrate with the local community.
After all, you left the UK for a new life, not to try & make your new country into a huge UK.
Lots of luck,
Johnny

The Koalas

I don't think anyone feeling or thinking like that is going mad, it is a natural reaction. It is funny how doctors and scientists say we suffer from SADS disease here in the UK, it is to do with lack sunshine and we are supposed to suffer it during the winter months, apparantly once the Sun is out we all take on a different attitude. Yet in Oz I had all the Sun I could wish for and yet i was still sad. Wonder what they would attribute that to?

When I first came back I was so happy to be back and thought how wonderful it was and in a way I had rose tinted glasses on. Now I see that the UK can be a depressing place and not everyone walks around smiling and greeting you on every corner. I lived in one place (will not name it for fear of backlash from folks on here) when i first got back and the people were so miserable and they live in a beautiful area! no one would look in my direction and everyone looked grey and bleak. When I was in Oz I thought the same about the Ozzies, arrogant, selfcentred, rednecks....you name it I labled them with it. I was absolutley determined not to like the people and place, I really believe now my attitude was very destructive and can see how people top themselves, they just get stuck in a rut and the more you dig down the harder it is to climb out.

I really feel that if you are there and you are so unhappy come back and take a deep breath and then consider doing it again once you have found what it is you were missing in the UK. I know people will say its not that easy money,houses, kids...... but if you really want something anything is possible.

Life is so short and death is so long, enjoy life while you are here it can be an adventure or a ball and chain around your leg, only you can choose which it is to be.

Eric

Merlot

Can you read my mind????

M

Kath

Just want to say thanks to Eric for some excellent contributions to this thread. As someone who has spent a few years in Australia and have now returned to UK I can say I've been on a similar journey to Eric!

For me moving back to England was a personal issue, not "England's better than Australia"! It's been a great learning experience and I really needed to get back here to think clearly. Only been back 3 months and still re-settling we are glad to be back in England at the moment but haven't ruled out a return to Aus in the future as we are dual nationality.

Good luck to all those on their journey!

ladylisa

Dont you think its not the country that counts, you could be living anywhere. I think its a shame that people compare countries as one being better than another, they are all just different. Really its the feelings inside you and the way that influences your reaction to things that counts.

I know of a US couple who have a welcome party for their neighbours everytime they move. Sometimes it is successful and sometimes not. The road that they recently moved to is full of people all wanting to meet each other but didnt know how. They all thanked my friends and now are all planning to do other activities. That is just one way we can influence our immediate environment. Just a smile can have a knock on effect to others around us.

anya4oz

My own experience has been that my neighbors here are somewhat less friendly than I had in the uk. However, it has to be said that only 2 sets of nieghbors back there were freindly, & they were a German couple and an Irish couple - so maybe less off the Brit 'stiff upper lip'! No one else bothered to speak to us, and people gave my cheery greetings short shrift, apart from the woman who heard my greeting & comment about the weather, then tore me off a strip for 'being an American' (I used to have a Canadian accent ).

Here in Melbourne, non-one seems to speak to each other in our road, tho our (Aussie) friend who lives round the corner has very friendly neighbors. One problem is that houses (and especially ours) are positioned in such a way that one does not get to see one's neighbors naturally.

I've been meaning to drop a flyer round the mailboxes asking who is up for a street party: we live in a very quiet road so it would be perfect. Also there are lot of people who have moved here like us within the last few months, so they may well all be sitting in their houses thinking how unfriendly all the rest of us are!

BTW, it's only the neighbors that haven't been friendly. I've made masses of other friends since I've been here, so it's certainly not a national trait.

Anya.

anya4oz

Yes, I hate the humidity as well. Heat is fine - we get 36-39C some days here in Melb, but because it's not humid or sticky, it's so much more bearable.

Actually, I thought Sydney could be quite humid (had several nasty days when I was working there one summer). One reason for our coming to Melb was the fresher weather!

Maybe, in some ways, the Melb weather, which is less tropical, is more acceptable to us Northern Hemisphere bods......!

Cheers
Anya.

Rosie n family

Hi Ian

I think the Aus city suburbs are generally pretty dead, the bowling clubs and the RSL's are the centres of activity. Get up to date with your scrap-booking skills, hold a tupperware party and get out there!
Hope to see you Sunday at the Sydney Meet?

Pollyana

I think this is so true; Most of the time I'm not actually consciously thinking that I'm in Australia, I could be in the UK, or I could be in any number of places. Life here is much the same for me as it was in the UK - go to work, go to the supermarket, occasionally meet up with people for a meal/drinks - whats missing is the long-standing friendships, the familiarity of places, but that would be the same if I had moved elsewhere within the UK.

What makes the difference is what you make of your life, and at present the limitations on my own lifestyle (health especially) mean that there is little difference between my life in Australia and what my life would be if I returned to the UK.

The Koalas

Yes I can and please don't think those thoughts you had 20 minutes ago again they are disgusting

ladylisa

Thats also a really interesting point Pollyana. After the initial elation of moving away life settles into the usual hum drum. Which for some reason surprises people when they are in England and waiting to move out. That is half the problem with going on holiday and thinking you could see yourself living in a place, you are starting off with an unrealistic view. I think it is harder on the people with close family and friends to move away however many people dont give their new home a chance and maybe they realise this by a visit back to England.

janeyray

Of COURSE I had friends Badge I'm a very easy going person and find making new friends very easy. I don't mind going up to someone I don't know and telling them all about myself. Now I sound a bit like you! (joking)

After only a week in Perth we had made a bunch of friends through that awful website Poms In Perth, met and Kings Park and kept in touch with at least three lots of people throughout our 16 months in Perth.

I made friends with a few of the mothers at my daughters school and became especially pally with a brilliant Aussie lady called Cathy. It was sad to leave her I must admit. I'm not one at all to stand in the shade and whinge on about having no friends especially if I hadn't made an effort. I still email quite a few of them. I miss the lady I worked for part time and I miss her horses

The lonliness came through my heart Badge, not through lack of friends. It's to hard to explain, I felt lonely being so far away, the country itself made me feel lonely, the lack of job opportunities that didn't come my way. The fact that I missed so much about the Uk made me feel lonely.

It's not just about who is and who isn't around you, it's about whats around you. Well for me anyway.

The Koalas

janeyray

I do not think anyone can understand anothers true feelings without walking in their shoes and truly feeling their inner emotions and we all know that is an impossibility. Badge is it seems at peace and harmony with himself in Australia and for him (not getting at you Bagde at all) it is hard for him to understand your story without saying why??? It is different for us all, some question badge and his happiness at bieng in Australia.

Years ago I lived in Wolverhampton, I lived in a terraced house with white English neighbours, by the time I left 5 years later the neighbours were 75% Indians/pakistani's. I often wondered why the asians didn't assimilate, we had some loveley neighbours and a lot of the Asian lads worked with me too, but still I never understood this desire to stay within their "own". When I moved to Holland I really understood this feeling and all of a sudden I said "Wow I now know why the Asians never mixed", it was something inside of me that just wanted to be around English people "Birds of a feather flock together" as they say. When I worked in Dutch factories I made many Dutch freinds but never formed tight relationships. Same when i went to Oz, I worked in some top companies and made good Oz freinds as I did New Zealanders, but I always got on well with British travellers or British Migrants already there. I remeber at one point bieng so down I watched Coronation street and cried!!! What a sight I looked

Janeyray, no matter how much you try you will never be able to express how you feel now or felt then, as long as you are happy that is all that matters. You have to be true to yourself and make yourself happy because no one else in this world will. I have seen things from both sides of the fence so sort of understand all points of view. I am glad I experienced the negative because it has helped me put a lot of things right for the positive.

Eric