A year on!

So now it's a whole year since I took the plunge and moved out here to the Sunshine Coast.  Since my last blog, I've had a great trip to the UK for Christmas and New Year. I found it to be very restorative - lots of hello and goodbye moments, lots of hugs, lots of meals with friends and family.  It was great for my soul and very healing, after four months of heartbreak pain. Even though I was away for 25 days, it felt very whistle-stop and there were lots of people I didn't get to see this time.  It was great to spend five days with my mum and sister, to have every meal with my mum for all that time - I don't think I've done that since I left home at 17! Such a privilege.

And seeing everyone happy and healthy made it much easier to leave the UK again on 5 January - I'm back again at the end of June to meet Nell, my first grand-daughter, in London, but it will only be a short trip as it's the Australian school holidays (2 weeks).

So what have I learned since I last blogged in November?



School
It was great to have four whole days of planning at the end of the school year - on one day, we had activities to lead (I did Xmas card making and film watching!), but then we had three whole days to work with our subject teams and plan the academic year ahead. What a luxury. It was just brilliant - I managed to plan the whole of the first fortnight back (assuming nothing on my timetable has changed in the holidays!). Working with subject teams also meant that we pooled tasks and knowledge, so that it was easier for everyone. I really hope this is an annual event!

One interesting fact re: pay - in the holidays there is an additional payment to teachers for "leave loading" - another 17.5% on your salary because you are on holiday. I checked online what this was - it stems back to the 1970s when people on holiday complained that they missed out on overtime because they were away - and this is the employer's response to that. I didn't get paid for the whole of the holidays (7 weeks) because I'd only worked at this school for 3 terms, not 4. I think next December/January I will get paid the whole holiday, as I'll have worked a whole academic year.

I also, for the first time in my career, went on strike with my union for 30 minutes (lost $32 in pay) - it's a long-running dispute between the union and the employer and hundreds of staff did the same thing at the same time. The dispute continues, it's hard to see how/when they will reach a compromise.

The House Move
On Monday the removalists came and took all the heavy stuff from my old place to the beach house - the worst part was the bed, an Australian one I bought here - it took them an hour to dismantle it, and another hour to re-build it. They were paid by the hour - $130 per hour - so it did add to the cost. Also in the move the washing machine door lock snapped - that will be another $455 to fix!  Getting WIFI connected has also taken a significant amount of time - Friday to Wednesday - but at last I have it, it's working and I'm back online. I had forgotten how much stuff is connected - TV for Netflix, printer for printing wireless, laptop, phones, ipad. Massive! While I was waiting for connection, I spend each evening in Macca's using their free Wifry. So helpful!

Leaving the old house was interesting- I wasn't sad to leave the area, it's very cramped and suburban, with all the patios backing on to each other. I had a bond cleaning company to do the cleaning - they were fantastic and well worth the $440 to do it. They do everything from filters in the aircon to ceiling lights to windows, just brilliant. Handing the keys back to the agent was a relief in a way - one less responsibility - I just hope my bond ($1680) comes back soon to help pay off all the other costs.

In the new beach house, I go to sleep and wake listening to the roar of the waves. There is a sea breeze most of the time, so I don't have the aircon or roof fans on. I've put felt pads on the back of the metal blinds so they don't bang (thanks Liddy for the tip!) and I'm using clever non-marking hooks on the walls to put up pictures (thanks Bunnings for the supply!).  It is great to feel that I have a place I can relax in, where it's very private and in a lovely location. I have walked to the parade of shops (about 5 mins) and found a little supermarket, coffee bar, burger bar - so that's my immediate needs covered!  I cycled down here last week from the old house, and back - 15km. And there are hills between my new place and the surf club - so Sunday mornings, when I'm cycling to do my shift at the surf club, I'll be burning way more calories!

I've got a huge double garage here which I'm using as storage for the many boxes of UK stuff I never unpacked last time. I've organised it pretty well with labels etc - but I am still amazed at how much I actually have/brought here!  I found my hammers and screwdrivers yesterday, which I hadn't seen since Garforth - such joy!  I'm building little storage units to put things on in the garage, to keep it relatively tidy.

My new neighbours are lovely - the landlord lives in one of the houses, and tenants like me in the other 3. He has popped in a couple of times, told me about the solar panels and the hot water, etc. It's really good to have such knowledge just up the road! The cats are settling pretty well, though they are desperate to go outside. The Council rules are that cats can't roam (otherwise they get "arrested" and you have to pay lots to get them out of Council hands) so when my finances sort themselves out, I'm going to get an external cat run built, to a cat flap in the screen door, so that they can be "outside" but not roam ... and not be a snack for the huge python which John next door says lives in the storm drain outside our houses! He only comes out when it's really hot, apparently - I'm hoping not to see him ever!  The soil here is obviously mainly sand - so I'm looking around at other people's gardens to see what will grow and what won't. I do miss having an English garden with David Austin roses - I have seen some roses since I moved here, but not so close to the sea.


Life
I'm enjoying the surf club on a Sunday morning - it gives me a focus and a feeling of doing something useful, as well as meeting lots of people and having a social life. I've done lots of training on CPR, oxy and Defib, as well as water safety. I feel more equipped to cope with a water incident; my goal is to be qualified to be a crew member on the IRB rescue boat - that will probably take me another 2 years.

I still go to yoga on Thursday nights and to Pilates on a Saturday morning, when it doesn't clash with hairdresser/bush care volunteer/training at the surf club. I love using my bike to get around and enjoy its baskets and panniers to carry shopping. I had an odometer fitted in December, so I can see how far I've traveled.

In late November we had a "hail-nado" here, where the sky turned green and from a blazing sunny day, huge hailstones the size of cricket balls fell on the Sunshine Coast. My poor car was outside (the old house had no garage to use) so it got very dimpled. The insurers wrote it off - it would cost $20k to fix it and car was only worth $15k. So my lovely cousins began the hunt for a new one for me, while I was away - and I picked it up last week. Another Toyota Corolla, this time a 2016 model and a white one. And in the new beach house, she can sit quietly in her garage, all safe from the hail. I need to always find a car park underground in future, just in case!






Overall, then, after a year - I'm definitely staying here. This is my home - there is so much about my old life here as a child which is slowly coming back to me. Not just the smells, but the relaxed way of life, how everyone chats to each other, everyone works hard, everyone looks out for each other. I still have a very strong Pommie accent and I doubt I will lose that now. I am proud of the life I have built so far, by myself and with the support of my lovely cousins nearby. I am happy that the cats have settled so well, though they're still hot a lot of the time! I am delighted that my children, my mum and my sister are all hale and hearty, and enjoying their lives in the UK. I count myself lucky that I have experienced two very different lives on either side of the globe, and that now, for my final chapter, I'm living my life how I want, where I want. It's weird in a way to have achieved that lifelong goal - of moving back here - because now there isn't a driving force that pushes me towards anything. I am just relaxed and taking each minute, each hour, each day as it comes. I am being present in my life, aware of what is happening as it happens. I take fewer pictures now, because I'm busy being in the moment, rather than recording it to show someone else later. I am looking forward to the summer, when my little one and her lovely husband move out here to Melbourne for a year's working, and to when my son and his lovely wife finally get to meet Nell when she appears. 2020 is going to be a great year.