Bermudashorts

I have been in Australia for two years today and I thought I would tag a second year onto my first year update. I have had a read through my post from a year ago and interestingly (or maybe not) much remains true.

So we are still living in that house in Collaroy with those ceiling to floor windows and ocean views, they now have blinds on them though! The first year was a little punishing, we asked for permission to put some blinds or curtains up and the landlord decided to install herself, they have come in very handy and are transparent so don't spoil the view either. We have just been offered another year at same rent or longer if we want, we think we will take it a year at a time though.

There is no sign of us being able to afford our own place just yet, whilst we will compromise to a degree, I don’t want to buy a house in an area that we really don’t want to be in and houses are pretty expensive in areas we do want to be in. We have toyed with a couple of alternative ideas, like buying an apartment or even buying a holiday / investment home somewhere else instead and renting long term in Sydney.

Anyways it is pretty tough buying a house here and we do have a very high joint income so it is something for newbies to be aware of. Last year we decided to take advantage of the weak £ to pay off our UK mortgage and are on track to do that by Christmas which is fabulous ... just means we have no deposit saved here. Fortunately I am not of the view that rent is "dead money", it is part of my living expenses like food and utiilities and so be it.

Work-wise I had mentioned last year that I had never worked harder and that the regime was chaotic. Well I still work hard, but have managed to put some order into the chaotic feeling that prevailed for much of my first year. Things got much easier, I came into my own. I was then asked to take a secondment to head up a huge group wide initiative, I am told that this is the *big job* in the group at the moment and there was only one other person they thought about for it and that it will be the icing on the cake for me. We shall see, I have to do a good job first. It is going well so far and I am enjoying it.

Mr BS is also doing fine at work, he is the boss of the small Asia Pac team now as I mentioned last year. He enjoys his work and he gets a couple of fancy international trips a year, this year he went to Chicago and next year he goes to Vancouver, as well as a couple of trips to Manila.

Speaking of travelling, we have tried to see some more of Australia this year. We have been up to Cairns / Port Douglas area and did a road trip up the NSW coast. We are going to Armidale / inland NSW in a few weeks. Closer to home we now frequent the Hunter Valley on a fairly regular basis to top up the cellar. Our international trip earlier this year was to Fiji.

In September we make our first trip back to the UK. I am excited but dreading it at the same time, I am dreading it because I wonder if it will provoke latent feelings of homesickness. I know it felt weird leaving the US last year and flying “home” to Australia, I felt like I should be going home to UK, so goodness knows how this will feel. But I am looking forward to spending time in my favourite city in the world (London) and we are also going to Bath as Mr BS has never been as well as having time to visit family and we will celebrate a family wedding whilst we are there.

We are disappointed not to have had any visitors yet, we couldn’t keep them away when we lived in Bermuda but the journey down under is putting people off. I guess it makes us feel less guilty about not spending all our time in our hometown when we visit in September. I would love to have some visitors for Christmas one year. I miss proper Christmas.

I have been sorry to miss some of the events in UK over the last two years; the Royal Wedding, the Jubilee celebrations and most recently Murray reaching the Wimbledon finals. Having spent a significant amount of my life (11 years) living in Wimbledon I can just imagine the buzz and reminds me of those years watching Henman on the big TV screens in the Village bars, I shall stay up Sunday night / Monday morning to watch. I am not sorry to miss the Olympics at all.

I don’t think our daily lives are better or worse than they were in the UK, but we came for the adventure and Australia has delivered on that score. After two years in Bermuda, I was climbing the walls and desperate to get back to the UK for good, here I feel like we have barely scratched the surface and there are so many things that I still want to see and do. I am looking forward to continuing our adventure.

carolinephillips

Great updated update!

Alfresco

Contgrats! That's awesome and a lovely update.

Only two more to go!

Mazza12

Lovely to read about your observations and experiences of life in Australia over the last 2 years! I move to Sydney in 44 days so found it a very interesting read - thanks for posting.

Hebe

Great update. Bermuda is so much closer to the UK and you can throw in a trip to Boston or New York on the way for a bit of retail therapy!!!! It's one of my favourite places. Lived there a while in the 80's and visited several times since

SillyOldBag

Really enjoyed reading your update - I always get the impression that you are happy with your life and that's a wonderful thing

Incidentally we must have been practically neighbours at one time, I learned to play piano in Wimbledon as a child, and as an adult spent way too much time drinking there

Pomster

we live 2 miles south of Wimbledon and the atmosphere passed us by completely! I do think the constant rain is really pulling people down and no-one seems to be getting into any of the activities this summer!

Hopefully it will be sunny by September.

Bermudashorts

Thank you SOB. Life is not without its tribulations for me too, but I never forget to count my blessings.

mrsgreenstar76

Great update & I'm glad it's all going well. I hope you continue to have a great time.

Kathryn V

Hello BS,

I was just wondering if you could answer me a question. I tried to email you, but that is not possible. Thanks. Kathryn

Bermudashorts

I decided another short update might be in order following that trip back to the UK that I mentioned in my second year update.

In fact the September trip turned out not to be my first trip back as I had "the call" in July when my much troubled younger sister took her own life, something I always kind of knew would happen one day considering her history. It was the same day that I made #23 post although I did not know what had happened at the time of writing.

We returned from our second trip to the UK this Thursday morning. In my second year update I had commented that I was worried the trip would make me feel homesick and might disrupt my generally settled feeling in Australia.

Well the UK trip was positive. It was nice to catch up with everyone under better circumstances this time and other than torrential rain on Sunday the weather was great, I don't know what everyone has been whinging about all year. It was pretty good in July too.

We attended a family wedding which was fun, visited the Harry Potter studio tour and we went to our house which is currently vacant and were relieved to see that it is in really good condition two years after we moved out. Everyone in the UK is doing just fine, family, friends, friends of friends, no sign of doom and gloom anywhere.

Most of all I enjoyed being in my beloved London for a few days at the end of the trip; we stayed at the Ritz and dined at Gordon Ramsay's and Heston Blumenthals, certainly dining experiences are much better in London than Sydney.

And yes it made me feel homesick. Not in the way I had imagined though ... for inexplicable reasons I missed Australia and I am so happy to be back. I am not sure why or when the change happened, I was always content here but I did not really think I was home. Now I do.

mrsgreenstar76

I'm sorry to hear about your sister. I'm glad this trip was positive though. It sounds like it went really well.

Alfresco

Also very sorry to hear about sister.

Glad you had a great time over in the UK though.

carolinephillips

Really sorry about your sister- mine is a depressive and self- harmer, so I know where you are coming from- and I'm glad that something positive came from your trip.

Welcome home.

Jen1977ni

Hi BS, I'm sorry about your sister, I recall you telling me about her a while back, not a nice call to get, especially when you're so far away. I too can agree with the above, as that's exactly the feeling I had when I was back in the UK in March, a week before I was due to leave, I found myself getting incredibly homesick and longing to be back in Australia. I too was shocked, but also very relieved as I knew, just like you, that Australia is now my home...