Dilemma Alberta vs Adelaide
Nov 9th 2007 | 11:19 pm
#1
Thread Starter
Forum Regular
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 106
From: unfortunately Edinburgh, but dreaming of a better life.
Dilemma Alberta vs Adelaide
My hubby has 3 years left in the British Army, at which point we want to emigrate. Since spending 2 years in Alberta, we have always had our hearts set on moving back there, as we love the lifestyle, hockey, skiing etc. We wanted to purchase a property there last year, but we horrified at how much the house prices have increased in Calgary and that along with the 30% deposit needed meant we couldn't afford it. Desperate to get on the housing ladder, we've finally purchased an investment property in Adelaide.
HOWEVER, now I am having doubts as to whether we should go to Australia instead. Job prospects for me would be the same in either as an HR professional, but there is the lure of more annual leave in Australia (shallow, I know) and having grown up in the Middle East, the lure of the sea, but I would so miss the snow and the hockey! Plus from what I've heard flexible working and family committments don't for very well with Corporate canadian culture!
We want to offer our daughter (only 2) a fantastic life and either would be great but I don't know which way to go! I keep trying to get hubby to xfer to Aussie Army so we could "try" Australia. There's also the issue of the 4 year wait to get a Canadian visa when we only have 3 years left in the Army!
Has anyone else faced a similar dilemma and how did you decide in the end??
Thanks for listening
Wozzie.
HOWEVER, now I am having doubts as to whether we should go to Australia instead. Job prospects for me would be the same in either as an HR professional, but there is the lure of more annual leave in Australia (shallow, I know) and having grown up in the Middle East, the lure of the sea, but I would so miss the snow and the hockey! Plus from what I've heard flexible working and family committments don't for very well with Corporate canadian culture!
We want to offer our daughter (only 2) a fantastic life and either would be great but I don't know which way to go! I keep trying to get hubby to xfer to Aussie Army so we could "try" Australia. There's also the issue of the 4 year wait to get a Canadian visa when we only have 3 years left in the Army!Has anyone else faced a similar dilemma and how did you decide in the end??
Thanks for listening
Wozzie.
Nov 10th 2007 | 3:13 am
#2
Now on Vancouver Island
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 6,935
From: Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada
Re: Dilemma Alberta vs Adelaide
It's a tough one.
If I was in your shoes, starting from scratch, I'd move to Australia.
But then I'm from South Africa originally, and there is so much about Australia that feels like home to me -- climate, vegetation, style of architecture, driving on the left, cricket, rugby, calling the second floor the first floor, and so on. Obviously the UK shares some of these features in common with Australia, but not others.
The other difference between you and me is that I have not taken to skiing in Canada (although one of my sons has). So the opportunities for skiing are not a draw for me. Also, the whole snow thing feels pretty old to me now. Yes, the first couple of times that it snows it looks beautiful, but thereafter it's just something that has to be shovelled off my driveway.
Ironically, just over thirty years ago, our authorizations to go to Canada and Australia came through within three days of each other. We had to make a quick decision. We'd been to neither country. As a newly married couple, it was all we could do to save for our air fares to a new country and a bit extra to buy a few basics when we got to the new place. A recce trip to either country was out of the question, and there were no Internet forums back then. Time was another issue. My husband, like all white South African males, was a conscript, and our emigration spared him, by a hair's breadth, from participating in South Africa's illegal invasion of Angola.
We read as much as we could about both countries. We also assessed the Australians and Canadians whom we'd met in South Africa. We had disliked the Australians, who struck us as brash, and liked the Canadians, who seemed civilized.
Another factor was that my husband had a distant relative in Calgary, an old woman whose mother had married a British soldier and left South Africa just after the Boer War. This elderly relative and her Canadian husband later were very hospitable to us when we arrived in Calgary.
Still another factor was the oil boom that was going on in Alberta at the time. My engineer husband felt that this would provide him with good job opportunities. This turned out to be true, at first, but there was a slump in the mid 1980s that was a challenge for everyone to weather. But now we're back to the boom times again. We also felt that Canada would benefit economically from its proximity to the USA's large economy, whereas we thought that Australia was out on a limb, geographically and economically.
Remember that that was the 1970s, and the Cold War was still in progress. If you had told me then that the Berlin Wall would fall, you would have been able to knock me over with a feather. Each person makes the best assessment that he/she can with the information available. So we landed in Calgary on February 28, 1977.
Fast forward to the latter part of the 1990s. The oil industry in Calgary had declined in the mid 1980s, and things were still tight in the mid 1990s. An oil company offered my husband an attractive job in Houston. We moved there in December 1995. The same company offered my husband a transfer to Melbourne, and we moved there in July 1997. Eventually we returned to Calgary in January 2000.
We loved Melbourne, and the Australians whom we encountered there were so friendly and so different from the Aussies whom we had met in South Africa all those years ago. I went to Australia equipped with prejudices born of years' worth of jokes about Australian men. For me at least, all the stereotypes turned out to be wrong. It started with the male flight attendant who looked after my children and me on our flight to Melbourne. He was so kind to us. Then, once we got to Melbourne, we found Melbournians -- both men and women -- to be friendly, helpful, considerate and welcoming.
When my husband and I got to Australia, we felt as if we had arrived "home." It felt like South Africa, but without South Africa's problems.
At first Australia felt really alien to our Canadian-born sons. Every factor that made Australia like home to my husband and me made it feel like another planet to our sons. They thought that people who watched cricket, much less played it, were somewhere down there on the food chain with algae. But they came to love Australia. They made great friends there. When we got to Australia they whined about North American foods that they missed, and then when we returned to Calgary they whined about Australian foods that they missed!
My husband and I loved Australia, and in some ways we would have loved to have stayed there permanently. But we discovered that, once you're middle aged, it becomes more complicated to move countries. For example, after five years' residence, Australia would not have recognized the tax-protected status of our Registered Retirement Savings Plans in Canada.
By that time my husband had twenty years' worth of experience and contacts in Calgary's oil industry. He didn't want to stay away for too long, because he felt that his "network" would start to unravel if he didn't nurture it.
Another thing that happened around that time was that a couple of my husband's old school friends died of cancer. One died in Edmonton, Alberta and another died in Auckland, New Zealand. The one who died in Auckland had been there for only 18 months. His wife said that the Cancer Society volunteers were incredibly helpful towards her. Still, it was a terrible blow for her, as a new comer with two teenage children, to be widowed so far away from her South African family and friends.
These deaths made my husband and me aware that we had entered a more vulnerable age group. We assessed where we had the largest group of long-standing friends, and we figured that group was in Calgary.
Having lived in both Australia and Canada, I would say that the social climates of both countries are reasonably similar. In my opinion the people of both countries are nice, on the whole.
So I think your decision comes down to other factors -- your assessment of the economy, what kind of climate you like, etc.
Good luck with your decision.
If I was in your shoes, starting from scratch, I'd move to Australia.
But then I'm from South Africa originally, and there is so much about Australia that feels like home to me -- climate, vegetation, style of architecture, driving on the left, cricket, rugby, calling the second floor the first floor, and so on. Obviously the UK shares some of these features in common with Australia, but not others.
The other difference between you and me is that I have not taken to skiing in Canada (although one of my sons has). So the opportunities for skiing are not a draw for me. Also, the whole snow thing feels pretty old to me now. Yes, the first couple of times that it snows it looks beautiful, but thereafter it's just something that has to be shovelled off my driveway.
Ironically, just over thirty years ago, our authorizations to go to Canada and Australia came through within three days of each other. We had to make a quick decision. We'd been to neither country. As a newly married couple, it was all we could do to save for our air fares to a new country and a bit extra to buy a few basics when we got to the new place. A recce trip to either country was out of the question, and there were no Internet forums back then. Time was another issue. My husband, like all white South African males, was a conscript, and our emigration spared him, by a hair's breadth, from participating in South Africa's illegal invasion of Angola.
We read as much as we could about both countries. We also assessed the Australians and Canadians whom we'd met in South Africa. We had disliked the Australians, who struck us as brash, and liked the Canadians, who seemed civilized.
Another factor was that my husband had a distant relative in Calgary, an old woman whose mother had married a British soldier and left South Africa just after the Boer War. This elderly relative and her Canadian husband later were very hospitable to us when we arrived in Calgary.
Still another factor was the oil boom that was going on in Alberta at the time. My engineer husband felt that this would provide him with good job opportunities. This turned out to be true, at first, but there was a slump in the mid 1980s that was a challenge for everyone to weather. But now we're back to the boom times again. We also felt that Canada would benefit economically from its proximity to the USA's large economy, whereas we thought that Australia was out on a limb, geographically and economically.
Remember that that was the 1970s, and the Cold War was still in progress. If you had told me then that the Berlin Wall would fall, you would have been able to knock me over with a feather. Each person makes the best assessment that he/she can with the information available. So we landed in Calgary on February 28, 1977.
Fast forward to the latter part of the 1990s. The oil industry in Calgary had declined in the mid 1980s, and things were still tight in the mid 1990s. An oil company offered my husband an attractive job in Houston. We moved there in December 1995. The same company offered my husband a transfer to Melbourne, and we moved there in July 1997. Eventually we returned to Calgary in January 2000.
We loved Melbourne, and the Australians whom we encountered there were so friendly and so different from the Aussies whom we had met in South Africa all those years ago. I went to Australia equipped with prejudices born of years' worth of jokes about Australian men. For me at least, all the stereotypes turned out to be wrong. It started with the male flight attendant who looked after my children and me on our flight to Melbourne. He was so kind to us. Then, once we got to Melbourne, we found Melbournians -- both men and women -- to be friendly, helpful, considerate and welcoming.
When my husband and I got to Australia, we felt as if we had arrived "home." It felt like South Africa, but without South Africa's problems.
At first Australia felt really alien to our Canadian-born sons. Every factor that made Australia like home to my husband and me made it feel like another planet to our sons. They thought that people who watched cricket, much less played it, were somewhere down there on the food chain with algae. But they came to love Australia. They made great friends there. When we got to Australia they whined about North American foods that they missed, and then when we returned to Calgary they whined about Australian foods that they missed!
My husband and I loved Australia, and in some ways we would have loved to have stayed there permanently. But we discovered that, once you're middle aged, it becomes more complicated to move countries. For example, after five years' residence, Australia would not have recognized the tax-protected status of our Registered Retirement Savings Plans in Canada.
By that time my husband had twenty years' worth of experience and contacts in Calgary's oil industry. He didn't want to stay away for too long, because he felt that his "network" would start to unravel if he didn't nurture it.
Another thing that happened around that time was that a couple of my husband's old school friends died of cancer. One died in Edmonton, Alberta and another died in Auckland, New Zealand. The one who died in Auckland had been there for only 18 months. His wife said that the Cancer Society volunteers were incredibly helpful towards her. Still, it was a terrible blow for her, as a new comer with two teenage children, to be widowed so far away from her South African family and friends.
These deaths made my husband and me aware that we had entered a more vulnerable age group. We assessed where we had the largest group of long-standing friends, and we figured that group was in Calgary.
Having lived in both Australia and Canada, I would say that the social climates of both countries are reasonably similar. In my opinion the people of both countries are nice, on the whole.
So I think your decision comes down to other factors -- your assessment of the economy, what kind of climate you like, etc.
Good luck with your decision.
Nov 10th 2007 | 3:50 am
#3
Banned
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 667
From: Cochrane near Calgary, Alberta
Re: Dilemma Alberta vs Adelaide
It's a tough one.
If I was in your shoes, starting from scratch, I'd move to Australia.
But then I'm from South Africa originally, and there is so much about Australia that feels like home to me -- climate, vegetation, style of architecture, driving on the left, cricket, rugby, calling the second floor the first floor, and so on. Obviously the UK shares some of these features in common with Australia, but not others.
The other difference between you and me is that I have not taken to skiing in Canada (although one of my sons has). So the opportunities for skiing are not a draw for me. Also, the whole snow thing feels pretty old to me now. Yes, the first couple of times that it snows it looks beautiful, but thereafter it's just something that has to be shovelled off my driveway.
Ironically, just over thirty years ago, our authorizations to go to Canada and Australia came through within three days of each other. We had to make a quick decision. We'd been to neither country. As a newly married couple, it was all we could do to save for our air fares to a new country and a bit extra to buy a few basics when we got to the new place. A recce trip to either country was out of the question, and there were no Internet forums back then. Time was another issue. My husband, like all white South African males, was a conscript, and our emigration spared him, by a hair's breadth, from participating in South Africa's illegal invasion of Angola.
We read as much as we could about both countries. We also assessed the Australians and Canadians whom we'd met in South Africa. We had disliked the Australians, who struck us as brash, and liked the Canadians, who seemed civilized.
Another factor was that my husband had a distant relative in Calgary, an old woman whose mother had married a British soldier and left South Africa just after the Boer War. This elderly relative and her Canadian husband later were very hospitable to us when we arrived in Calgary.
Still another factor was the oil boom that was going on in Alberta at the time. My engineer husband felt that this would provide him with good job opportunities. This turned out to be true, at first, but there was a slump in the mid 1980s that was a challenge for everyone to weather. But now we're back to the boom times again. We also felt that Canada would benefit economically from its proximity to the USA's large economy, whereas we thought that Australia was out on a limb, geographically and economically.
Remember that that was the 1970s, and the Cold War was still in progress. If you had told me then that the Berlin Wall would fall, you would have been able to knock me over with a feather. Each person makes the best assessment that he/she can with the information available. So we landed in Calgary on February 28, 1977.
Fast forward to the latter part of the 1990s. The oil industry in Calgary had declined in the mid 1980s, and things were still tight in the mid 1990s. An oil company offered my husband an attractive job in Houston. We moved there in December 1995. The same company offered my husband a transfer to Melbourne, and we moved there in July 1997. Eventually we returned to Calgary in January 2000.
We loved Melbourne, and the Australians whom we encountered there were so friendly and so different from the Aussies whom we had met in South Africa all those years ago. I went to Australia equipped with prejudices born of years' worth of jokes about Australian men. For me at least, all the stereotypes turned out to be wrong. It started with the male flight attendant who looked after my children and me on our flight to Melbourne. He was so kind to us. Then, once we got to Melbourne, we found Melbournians -- both men and women -- to be friendly, helpful, considerate and welcoming.
When my husband and I got to Australia, we felt as if we had arrived "home." It felt like South Africa, but without South Africa's problems.
At first Australia felt really alien to our Canadian-born sons. Every factor that made Australia like home to my husband and me made it feel like another planet to our sons. They thought that people who watched cricket, much less played it, were somewhere down there on the food chain with algae. But they came to love Australia. They made great friends there. When we got to Australia they whined about North American foods that they missed, and then when we returned to Calgary they whined about Australian foods that they missed!
My husband and I loved Australia, and in some ways we would have loved to have stayed there permanently. But we discovered that, once you're middle aged, it becomes more complicated to move countries. For example, after five years' residence, Australia would not have recognized the tax-protected status of our Registered Retirement Savings Plans in Canada.
By that time my husband had twenty years' worth of experience and contacts in Calgary's oil industry. He didn't want to stay away for too long, because he felt that his "network" would start to unravel if he didn't nurture it.
Another thing that happened around that time was that a couple of my husband's old school friends died of cancer. One died in Edmonton, Alberta and another died in Auckland, New Zealand. The one who died in Auckland had been there for only 18 months. His wife said that the Cancer Society volunteers were incredibly helpful towards her. Still, it was a terrible blow for her, as a new comer with two teenage children, to be widowed so far away from her South African family and friends.
These deaths made my husband and me aware that we had entered a more vulnerable age group. We assessed where we had the largest group of long-standing friends, and we figured that group was in Calgary.
Having lived in both Australia and Canada, I would say that the social climates of both countries are reasonably similar. In my opinion the people of both countries are nice, on the whole.
So I think your decision comes down to other factors -- your assessment of the economy, what kind of climate you like, etc.
Good luck with your decision.
If I was in your shoes, starting from scratch, I'd move to Australia.
But then I'm from South Africa originally, and there is so much about Australia that feels like home to me -- climate, vegetation, style of architecture, driving on the left, cricket, rugby, calling the second floor the first floor, and so on. Obviously the UK shares some of these features in common with Australia, but not others.
The other difference between you and me is that I have not taken to skiing in Canada (although one of my sons has). So the opportunities for skiing are not a draw for me. Also, the whole snow thing feels pretty old to me now. Yes, the first couple of times that it snows it looks beautiful, but thereafter it's just something that has to be shovelled off my driveway.
Ironically, just over thirty years ago, our authorizations to go to Canada and Australia came through within three days of each other. We had to make a quick decision. We'd been to neither country. As a newly married couple, it was all we could do to save for our air fares to a new country and a bit extra to buy a few basics when we got to the new place. A recce trip to either country was out of the question, and there were no Internet forums back then. Time was another issue. My husband, like all white South African males, was a conscript, and our emigration spared him, by a hair's breadth, from participating in South Africa's illegal invasion of Angola.
We read as much as we could about both countries. We also assessed the Australians and Canadians whom we'd met in South Africa. We had disliked the Australians, who struck us as brash, and liked the Canadians, who seemed civilized.
Another factor was that my husband had a distant relative in Calgary, an old woman whose mother had married a British soldier and left South Africa just after the Boer War. This elderly relative and her Canadian husband later were very hospitable to us when we arrived in Calgary.
Still another factor was the oil boom that was going on in Alberta at the time. My engineer husband felt that this would provide him with good job opportunities. This turned out to be true, at first, but there was a slump in the mid 1980s that was a challenge for everyone to weather. But now we're back to the boom times again. We also felt that Canada would benefit economically from its proximity to the USA's large economy, whereas we thought that Australia was out on a limb, geographically and economically.
Remember that that was the 1970s, and the Cold War was still in progress. If you had told me then that the Berlin Wall would fall, you would have been able to knock me over with a feather. Each person makes the best assessment that he/she can with the information available. So we landed in Calgary on February 28, 1977.
Fast forward to the latter part of the 1990s. The oil industry in Calgary had declined in the mid 1980s, and things were still tight in the mid 1990s. An oil company offered my husband an attractive job in Houston. We moved there in December 1995. The same company offered my husband a transfer to Melbourne, and we moved there in July 1997. Eventually we returned to Calgary in January 2000.
We loved Melbourne, and the Australians whom we encountered there were so friendly and so different from the Aussies whom we had met in South Africa all those years ago. I went to Australia equipped with prejudices born of years' worth of jokes about Australian men. For me at least, all the stereotypes turned out to be wrong. It started with the male flight attendant who looked after my children and me on our flight to Melbourne. He was so kind to us. Then, once we got to Melbourne, we found Melbournians -- both men and women -- to be friendly, helpful, considerate and welcoming.
When my husband and I got to Australia, we felt as if we had arrived "home." It felt like South Africa, but without South Africa's problems.
At first Australia felt really alien to our Canadian-born sons. Every factor that made Australia like home to my husband and me made it feel like another planet to our sons. They thought that people who watched cricket, much less played it, were somewhere down there on the food chain with algae. But they came to love Australia. They made great friends there. When we got to Australia they whined about North American foods that they missed, and then when we returned to Calgary they whined about Australian foods that they missed!
My husband and I loved Australia, and in some ways we would have loved to have stayed there permanently. But we discovered that, once you're middle aged, it becomes more complicated to move countries. For example, after five years' residence, Australia would not have recognized the tax-protected status of our Registered Retirement Savings Plans in Canada.
By that time my husband had twenty years' worth of experience and contacts in Calgary's oil industry. He didn't want to stay away for too long, because he felt that his "network" would start to unravel if he didn't nurture it.
Another thing that happened around that time was that a couple of my husband's old school friends died of cancer. One died in Edmonton, Alberta and another died in Auckland, New Zealand. The one who died in Auckland had been there for only 18 months. His wife said that the Cancer Society volunteers were incredibly helpful towards her. Still, it was a terrible blow for her, as a new comer with two teenage children, to be widowed so far away from her South African family and friends.
These deaths made my husband and me aware that we had entered a more vulnerable age group. We assessed where we had the largest group of long-standing friends, and we figured that group was in Calgary.
Having lived in both Australia and Canada, I would say that the social climates of both countries are reasonably similar. In my opinion the people of both countries are nice, on the whole.
So I think your decision comes down to other factors -- your assessment of the economy, what kind of climate you like, etc.
Good luck with your decision.
Nov 10th 2007 | 3:51 am
#4
Retired
Joined: Apr 2004
Posts: 34,646
Re: Dilemma Alberta vs Adelaide
Judy has given you a very good reply.
One of the key issues is that unless you qualify to have your Canadian application processed quickly, the standard Canadian timescale is so long (around 5 years) that in the same amount of time, you could have migrated to Australia and become Australian citizens.
Recognition of U.K. qualifications is not perfect in Australia, but seems less of an issue than in Canada (depends on province and trade/profession).
Is it just a choice between Alberta and Adelaide? Why not somewhere else in Australia?
One of the key issues is that unless you qualify to have your Canadian application processed quickly, the standard Canadian timescale is so long (around 5 years) that in the same amount of time, you could have migrated to Australia and become Australian citizens.
Recognition of U.K. qualifications is not perfect in Australia, but seems less of an issue than in Canada (depends on province and trade/profession).
Is it just a choice between Alberta and Adelaide? Why not somewhere else in Australia?
Nov 10th 2007 | 5:15 am
#5
Bristolish expat
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 1,700
From: Bristol ~ Nanaimo, BC ... It's a bit like Salem's Lot!!
Re: Dilemma Alberta vs Adelaide
My hubby has 3 years left in the British Army, at which point we want to emigrate. Since spending 2 years in Alberta, we have always had our hearts set on moving back there, as we love the lifestyle, hockey, skiing etc. We wanted to purchase a property there last year, but we horrified at how much the house prices have increased in Calgary and that along with the 30% deposit needed meant we couldn't afford it. Desperate to get on the housing ladder, we've finally purchased an investment property in Adelaide.
HOWEVER, now I am having doubts as to whether we should go to Australia instead. Job prospects for me would be the same in either as an HR professional, but there is the lure of more annual leave in Australia (shallow, I know) and having grown up in the Middle East, the lure of the sea, but I would so miss the snow and the hockey! Plus from what I've heard flexible working and family committments don't for very well with Corporate canadian culture! We want to offer our daughter (only 2) a fantastic life and either would be great but I don't know which way to go! I keep trying to get hubby to xfer to Aussie Army so we could "try" Australia. There's also the issue of the 4 year wait to get a Canadian visa when we only have 3 years left in the Army!
Has anyone else faced a similar dilemma and how did you decide in the end??
Thanks for listening
Wozzie.
HOWEVER, now I am having doubts as to whether we should go to Australia instead. Job prospects for me would be the same in either as an HR professional, but there is the lure of more annual leave in Australia (shallow, I know) and having grown up in the Middle East, the lure of the sea, but I would so miss the snow and the hockey! Plus from what I've heard flexible working and family committments don't for very well with Corporate canadian culture!
We want to offer our daughter (only 2) a fantastic life and either would be great but I don't know which way to go! I keep trying to get hubby to xfer to Aussie Army so we could "try" Australia. There's also the issue of the 4 year wait to get a Canadian visa when we only have 3 years left in the Army!Has anyone else faced a similar dilemma and how did you decide in the end??
Thanks for listening
Wozzie.
After a couple of months of phone calls back & forth home my brother got the 'bug' & decided to give OZ a try, Adelaide in particular. (They looked into Canada but didn't fancy the wait) He applied in 2005 & was there in 2006, he works outdoors quite a lot & loves it there, he says the weather is fantastic & has had no problems with the bugs!! (not inside the house, anyway) The only bugbear for him is the distance from the UK, we've had 6 visitors but no-one has been to visit him 
the length of the flight & the price puts a lot of folks off.As for job prospects, dunno if he was just one of the lucky ones but found decent jobs fairly easily (Carpenter) as did his OH.
2 years for citizenship for him (I think) so he will be eligable next year, the same as us
Last edited by bananahammock; Nov 10th 2007 at 5:20 am.
