brits1

Excellent could not of written your two threads any better....ditto everything you said....
Jackie

St.Georges Girl

Hiya Kriss, I just want to say that I wouldn't have been happy for our son to walk home form his girlfriends house in Currambine along Burns Beach Road to Iluka, I always went to pick him up before he could drive. He walked home from Ocean Reef once, part the way with mates and then the rest of the way on his own. A group of lads in a car stopped along side him, almost as soon as his friends had turned into their roads and beat the living shit out of him. He was 16. He and a friend were on the train going to the WACA (during the day) and had to give up their money & phones, because they were threatened with knives and punched and kicked by a gang of both boys and girls who got on the train at Warwick. It happens everywhere. Recently our friends 14 year old was beaten to a pulp on a Sunday lunchtime down at Iluka Park by some kids who live in C'bine and Connolly. As the poor kid knew where one of the gang lived, our friends went to his house. The following w/e a large gang of kids gathered outside our friends house and started throwing rocks over the wall and at the front door and windows. The dad phoned for my OH to go up and help him sort them out, which he did, but they came back later and caused quite a bit of damage. The case is now going to court.

BTW Issie and Tracey, there are secondary schools here that have a police attendance and have done for many years.

Tracey, all I can say to you is that by reading your posts, I feel you are being too analytical and taking in all the tripe about the UK, probably much like you took in all the hype about Oz before you came here. Only you and your OH can make the decision, but for me personally, I regret enormously bringing our son here away from his extended family and always will. He has missed out on growing up with his cousins and spending precious time, holidays etc.with all our family, all of which are very close. We are going home next year when he finishes uni and nothing anyone says will make any difference. I know in my heart of hearts, even after 10½ long years here, that life for us was better back home and being with family means everything. My heart isn't here, I left it along with my soul in England. I just don't belong here. It's a shallow place and unless you have lots of $, you are pretty much stuck here with just beaches, ocean, Adventure World and parks.

rabsody

Good post, I echo some of your sentiments. Good luck with all your plans

St.Georges Girl

Thanks R. It's been a long hard haul to be honest, although we have had some good times, but you cannot turn back the years. I would always advise that if you do have close family and you spend time with them on a regular basis, think very seriously about migrating 'cos it ain't no short trip back home.

rabsody

Tell me about it! And a sizeable chunk of your yearly salary to boot!

LouiseD

Totally agree with your post SGG. We too listened to all the tripe only to find we were totally duped. There are good and bad places everywhere. Good and bad people everywhere.

manc1

Good post king kong. I also noticed that there were lots of empty parks with no kids in them when I arrived in oz. Seems to me parents spend all there time at week-ends driving there kids to sporting events.

king kong

Hi shoz i am intrigued by your post as obviously you are going to ping pong but i have read some of your previous posts and although you are entitled to change you mind ,god forbid i change mine 20 times a day ,i am wondering seriously wether you are looking through rose tinted glasses .
I am not in any way making a personal attack on you in anyway ,it just seemed you was so adamant that the uk was better at one time and i suppose it is what is working inside your head that seems to think its better here then there when infact it doesnt matter which way you look at it from Health,money ,housing ,violence in society ,drugs ,schooling are comparable .
On a personal note in regards to my own situation ,if and when i go back to the uk it will be because i love the country not my extended family etc which are often the wrong reasons to move back .

pommybird

Great post and well done on giving this thread a reality check - in my 2 years in Perth I saw plenty of very undesirable behaviour from trouble makers on the streets - some as young as 10 and 11.

I hope you're back home where you belong soonxx

ShozInOz

We changed our mind in Australia roughly *one million times* about where we wanted to live. One issue was that we never planned to move there. A job was offered to me, and I snapped it up in about three seconds. We moved to Aus and thought, "oh, we live 12,000 miles away". (Though I don't know what can prepare anyone for such a move.) I suffered pretty extreme homesickness for a few months. Then we were 50/50, 60/40, 40/60 for a long time . I was quite open about this and generally saw pros and cons on both sides. (I even accepted a new job in Aus just before we returned, then rejected it. We didn't know what was for the best.) When we had a baby, my wife loved Aus once she found some friends as they were out every day in the park, by the beach, at the pool, etc. But family issues came into it, and I still longed for the vibe and geography of the UK as I had experienced it as a non-parent, and seeing some very good friends and family. Also I was in a low paying job (lecturer) on a single income, which did limit us somewhat (though somehow we were financially better off than we are now with me earning much more and wife working P/T). The family emphasis changed when my wife lost her Mum a week before we returned.

What we knew then is the same now - our day to day life was better in Australia, and our occasional life was better in the UK. The former is still quite true, the latter not really. What we did not account for is that what matters with a child (for us) is the day to day life because this has the most impact on our quality of life and stress. The occasional things that we enjoyed (hill walking, driving up and down the country, short breaks to Europe, going out here there and everywhere) without children are mostly now not feasible with children for us. Any enjoyment that they bring is outweighed by the sheer stress involved. As I say, this is different probably with older children, or with none. We did not factor this into our decision to return, but even if we had, it wouldn't have mattered enough until we felt it. And coming back was a great move, because had we not, we would STILL be wondering where to live, as are many other people on this forum who are still in Australia and were wondering where to live when I was there. That is not a good place to be. But in order to get out of this you have to convince yourself, one way or the other - otherwise you are stuck in Limbo. Many posts on here are from people trying to convince themselves by writing about their situation. That is a perfectly valid thing to do. It doesn't mean it will work out that way.

On moving back, the first summer was great, but come late 2006 there was no 50/50 any more - I knew we had outgrown the UK. And I have only had occasional doubts since (and none for many months). This is quite different to our time in Sydney, which was characterised by uncertainty (hence many Expat posts then, few now).

It really comes down to feelings. In Australia I experienced joy (an enormous sense of wellbeing, many times just walking to work - I put it down to sunlight), calm (again, sunlight related I think), fun (outdoors, a lot), isolation (miles from anywhere, stuck in Sydney, like living on an island), annoyance (during intense heat, especially with flies), light (important for me), positivity (infectious, sometimes annoyingly parochial), doubt (about where to live). In the UK, I experience stress (about the pace of life, traffic, cost of living), fear (about the future, about going out at night - much of it probably quite irrational on inspection), discomfort (cold, wet), dark (cloud, a lot), negativity/pessimism (among many people, expressed spontaneously and without prompting), certainty (about where to live), joy (which is unfortunately far too seasonal). I don't accept the Daily Mail view (God knows if it was the last newspaper on earth I would only use it for kindling material). I just accept my experience.

The important thing to emphasise is that these are just my feelings and perceptions, and I always try to make that clear. This is why almost everything on here is, depressingly, of very little use whatsoever in helping anyone to make a decision - most of it is simply not applicable. Everyone is in different situations with regard to expectations, values, family, interests, activities, careers, finances, etc. Even people living in places that would appall us may be more satisfied with life. We are both luck and unlucky to have a choice.

Pompeyboy

Whatever you decide dont think of it as a defeat, just another phase of a big adventure...life!

TraceyW

Fantastic, down to earth, reality check. Good for you that you have now discovered where you want to be. O.k, it may have cost a few quid, but peace of mind is priceless.

I hope you have a long and happy future ahead of you in Sydney

St.Georges Girl

I agree and I too want to go home because I love the UK and what it has to offer and, it is where I feel I belong. We didn't leave with bitterness about the country, infact, quite the opposite. There were no programmes on tv about migration to Australia or any other country for that matter, so we weren't bowled over by any hype. We didn't have the internet to do any in depth research, we just took a holiday here in 1993 and thought it might be quite nice to live here for awhile. That has turned out to be the case, for awhile. I've done my time and I'm ready to go home. Coming back here gets harder each time we go home, so when our son graduates from uni', hopefully we are off.

Thanks alot P. Sometimes I think it's easy to forget that there are so few people here compared to the UK, but per capita, crime, drugs, violence etc.etc. is on a par. As has been said many times before, the Australian media has a narrow minded approach when it comes to reporting crime etc..The British media go too far.

scoobydoo

I dont worry at all about raising my kids in the UK, I worry very much about raising them in Australia.

I find Australian kids rude, loud with no manners or respect, in general for anything. Having spent the last couple of weeks using public transport, I am surprised to what I have witnessed - kids shouting, graffitying,littering and generally bullying old and elderly people who use public transport. It seems that their Australian parents let them out and dont care what they get up to. They take no responsibility - and to be honest, I find their Australian loud and brash voices annoy me on a daily basis.

I have spent two years working as a counsellor, and without breaching confidentiality, am more than 100% certain where I want to bring up my kids and its not here. Some of the stories I have been told, including over abuse of drugs, child sexual abuse, bullying, violence and crime have astounded me. I thought I was pretty switched on having lived in the UK, but no. I am leaving Australia for good in two days time and just cant wait to go.

No, in my opinion, its not a better place to raise kids. In my opinion Australia is full of false people, they tell you they feel good, when they dont, they ask you how your day's going, and dont want to know when its not going well. They appear friendly, kind and helpful. If you dig deeper, there is nothing there - no intelligence, no empathy, no etiquette, no character. In two years I have not made any Australian friends, put it honestly, I dont like them as people, dont like their culture, and more importantly I dont want my kids raised as Australians. I am proud to be British... and so will they be.

My opinion, I know......each to their own.

St.Georges Girl

Wow! Strong opinions, but much of it I have to agree with sadly. All the best back in blighty S', just wish it was my turn. I am just praying that once we've left here, our son doesn't decide to return if he gets married and has children of his own. The thought of having a grandchild growing up as an Australian depresses me somewhat, for reasons I shan't bother going into on here, but they are many and all heartfelt.