Hi Jamie
Good to hear from you again, mate.
When I was in my 20s & 30s (I'm now 51) I was given chance after chance to migrate to Australia and I turned them all down. Now, of course, it would be nigh on impossible to do it via the skilled route.
Looking back over the last 20 years or so (I did a very long training for the legal profession so I didn't really get the chance to come up for air till I was about 26) if I had the time over again, Jamie, I'd have done the Cynical Thing. I'd have gone to Oz for long enough to secure dual citizenship so that forever after, the choice would be mine.
Don't do what I did, Jamie. Don't pass up the chance. I now wish that I hadn't. A LOT of suburban, modern Australia is very "family & children" orientated and is pretty boring for someone who is single. Sydney is different, however. (I think Melborne is too, probably, but I was only 16 the only time I've been to Melbourne and don't remember anything much about it apart from that it did not seem to me to have the same vibrant buzz as Sydney.)
If I were you, I'd go back. I think I would probably collect the car and then hit the road. I wouldn't - in your situation - be looking to "settle" immediately. I'd go and explore Australia instead.
Don't look for a woman, chum. Look for Australia. Approach this in the right way and the right woman will find you. But you will not find Australia in the suburbs of the big cities. Sydney would give you a great social life and put money in your wallet, but that is an infinitesimal view of Australia. It IS the Lucky Country, without doubt, but one is never going to find that by exchanging a suburb in the UK for one out in Oz All that that ever achieves is different scenery if you ask me.
The only thing you will find in the suburbs is Man Made Reality created in the last 40 or so years. Bloody hell. Australia is a place with 40 million years of history behind her. Who in their right mind wants to look at a pile of bricks called a wall when they could be looking at Kakadu National Park instead?
These sorts of ideas bite the dust - big style bite the dust - when there are children in tow but when you are single, the ideas are possible. Think BIG, Jamie, I reckon.
If I were your age today and I had the
PR visa, I would tell the world, "Right. The next 5 years is Me Tiime. I'm off for a proper look at Australia and I intend to start in Coober Pedy. From the sound of it, it is the backside of Hell. But I'm going to go and look and then decide for myself. When I've found out about Coober Pedy, I'll be off to Kakadu next. I'll send the occasional postcard . Lurve, Gill."
Jamie - you are a natural writer. The style and grace simply flows from your fingers onto the screen. I have to mangle the language to get it to work - you don't. You play your cards right and I think you are actually a freelance journalist, my friend. There is no finer canvas for that than Australia.
Hugz
Gill
xx
