Hearth, Home and some dirt

I have been working and looking at plots and houses and not much else. Before we came over, I had worked doing the same job for pretty much 11 years and so the comfort zone was entrenched. Apart from moving countries, and all that that entails, changing to a corporate from an entrepeneurial environment has been a huge change. When I was back in SA, I often wondered what day to day life would be / was like in Aus and my view now is that it really depends. It is similar to SA or anywhere else for that matter in the sense that some people work long hours and others not. The biggest difference is the size of the middle class, so whatever job you have, you generally can own a house and car and go overseas on holiday once a year. I seem to remember that the median age of Sydneysiders is under 35 so it is a young city: the fire / smoke alarm inspector looked like a kid out of school and the truck drivers hardly look old enough to have their licence. Up the road from us is Sydney Olympic park where the main stadia are that were used for the 2000 Olympics. We are boring people, but if you are into concerts: e.g. the other night Beyonce was there, Britney Spears is coming, Fleetwood Mac as well as Nickleback, Green Day etc - tons of International acts come here often which we missed in SA. This is truly a world city. I have to commit to get you guys to hold me to it, otherwise I will procrastinate, but I will - or rather I will get my brother, since he is good at photography, to take some photos of the stadium area at night - it is a stunning sight! The lighting is groovy, baby! So that will be our little project for this weekend and we will post on the blog.

We have kind of, sort of, decided that we will most probably live South of Sydney in an area called Bingara Gorge. This is a golf estate which is a relatively new concept here in Australia compared to SA. Not that either of us play golf, but we can try. It is like living in the farmlands which is great to raise kids, not that we have kids but we can keep trying. :-) The place is: http://www.bingaragorge.com.au/llweb/bingaragorge/main.nsf And we were assisted by the saleslady who is an ex Saffer from Benoni!

Ok so much for the land. Well after walking through close on 100 display homes altogether - some a few times, we settled on a design, but are a little bit unsure of the builder. If you want to buy anything in Aus - you can check the supplier out on: http://www.productreview.com.au/ and if you search the builders, almost all have people moaning about them. So yes something similar to SA, and you choose the one who has been least sued, pretty much. Will let you know, but from the time you put pen to paper and the builders handover, it is not like SA - it takes 12 months to build a house here. Sometimes longer.

Other than seeking a habitat, we almost became a cautionary tale. We had been on the lookout for a retirement village for when the folks eventually come over and we almost put their names up on the spot as a certain development looked stunning and the display homes excellent, but my eagle eyed mother in SA noticed something, googled them and discovered that the scheme is under investigation by the Australian securities commission. We had been warned by ex Saffers not to get too blase about crime here, just because it isn't violent. Perhaps we had not been as cautious in our approach as we should have been, so we learned that lesson just in time. In such a regulated society, when you think nothing bad could happen, it easily lulls you. Investors are out $25 million on that scheme so we'll see what the investigation yields. I saw the name Kebbel on the docs, can you believe it! Not sure if there is a connection. Anyway.

And yes, (sigh) still waiting for our container...