docboat

Use Dropbox - much easier, and you do not carry it with you

But if you want simply such information, there is a nice website here: http://www.livethelifeinperth.com/ Schools - looking from the outside is not much use. Look at the suburbs, in particular, if you had time, go shopping in the area shopping hub, and listen to the conversationsof the mothers at checkout, or in the playgrounds. Sit in a playground near such schools, and let the kids play while you speak to the parents. Suburbs to avoid - there are lists of crime areas, on the web. No info on sites at the moment from me

Let me rephrase what @Bungo said: 1 week is not nearly sufficient for such a decision. That decision - do I want to emigrate - is made at home in the UK, a result of a cold clear series of thoughts and decisions that result in the unemotional conclusion that emigration is right for you. I think what you meant to say (correct me if I am wrong) is that you have made a decision on emigrating (probably to Perth by preference), but want to spend 1 week in Perth to see if there is anything here that turns you off the idea, or is a deal breaker. And again, 1 week here is not nearly long enough. You will be barely off the plane before you get back on again. It is not just Perth, but WA as a whole, to which you are emigrating, and at the very least you will need to "feel" what our state is like. The contributions above are all correct, many good ideas to be chased down. You will have a good holiday, but that does NOT mean that you have a good idea of what life here is actually like. Do you have any friends who are resident here? If so, stay with them and talk long into the night about what makes them happy, what makes them mad about Perth. People like myself love Perth, would not live anywhere else, so our opinions are biased. Find someone who hates Perth and ask them. Their opinions are biased too. Sit under the shade of a tree at the beach here, with a beer if you will, and imagine what it would be like here if you lost your car, and needed to use public transport. Or could not find a rental house, and needed a hotel for a while. Or your employer folded ... what would you need to do? Or if you wanted to drop in on the parents but they are at the other end of the world? My suggestion is that you consider making more time to really absorb what it means to live in Perth, and look at more regional options as well, Geraldton, Bunbury, maybe even Northam or York. At least travel to a few places.

We live in Harrisdale near Jandakot - large and growing community with excellent schools and good shopping nearby. Friendly, safe, could not be happier. Lots of new housing, and a lot is being built to rent.

Look, you either want to come to Australia, or you do not. if you want to come to Australia, you will do so, get a job, any job, and work your way up from there. If you start wondering about your benefits from the get go,then you are really better off staying at home. I think you have answered your own question.

If you can provide documentary evidence of having been to school in a country where English is the language, then you can be exempted - at least that is the way it used to be for the 457 visa. And no ... X University Medical School does not count as a school.

Good advice above. I reiterate the need to change the thinking. Settling in Australia - not moving to Australia - is paramount. To settle, you need to have the mindset in place. Here is home. My grandfather used to say "home is where you hang your hat" and that is very true. If you regard anywhere else as home, then that is the place you wish to return to, and that means the "here" is not home and you are not settled. Being settled does not mean that you are not "homesick" - you will be. You will be in a new place, with new smells, new foods, new ideas. AFL, for example, will become an essential item for discussion. It will be exciting, and challenging, and wonderful. Embrace the challenge, learn to love exploring, delving into the facets of your new home. Keep an active mind and an active body. Make friends - well, acquaintances, initially. Try new activities, get involved. Above all, get involved. And good luck!

Scots together

Advice - see a counsellor Now, to address your questions (and you may want to stop reading here ...) - 1. This is entirely about you, and you need to address that. You cannot say your son needs friends. Go out to the local playground. Get him into play groups. Buy a dog and take the dog for walks with your son. 2. This is entirely about you. Your partner seems happy in Australia. You want to get back to family - nothing wrong with that. Does your partner miss family in the UK as much? And if not, will you drag her away from a better life here? 3. This is entirely about you. You really think Australian business is unprofessional? In the words of Monty Python ..."Oh yeah? How much?" And you now reply " .... A lot!" And so what? You need to be unprofessional too? Or is this just another excuse in the litany of trying to make up a good reason to leave Australia? 4. This is entirely about you. You think about bad things happening to parents. And if they, heaven forbid, were to experience an illness or be in peril of sudden death, this is part of normal ageing, and can be dealt with by a visit, short term employment. 5. This is entirely about you. Oh yes, the holidays. You are bored on weekends. Oh dear. Bicycling Rifle club Surfing Kayaking Hiking Join the scouts and train youngsters Parachuting Scuba diving Volunteering for disabled My God, the list could go on for ages. Bored on weekends - get a grip man! So - get some counselling. It is all about you, not Australia, not your partner, not your son, not your parents, not Europe. So any decision you make is liable to be the wrong one. Find out what is really going on - ie do what your partner says - and then communicate on your best options. It is your emotions that need attention, not your place of residence. There may be a real depressive illness going on.

Selfish? Of course. You are, after all, supposed to live YOUR life, not somebody elses life. You choose, with your partner, to make a life for you and yourselves - and for you and yourselves alone. If you start creating your life around someone elses life, then you are not living your life to the full potential. So go with your passion, and make your life as perfect as you can. IF that "perfect" means that you live for another family (even if it is your own close family members) and IF that choice is because it represents your freedom and passion, then go for it and stay in the UK. Just be aware of the underlying motivations, because if you mistake them, you end up less happy.

I think you have a very clear idea of the issues. It has been pointed out though - and I completely agree - that the main issue may really be semantics. If you continue to view Edinburgh as home, then you will always consider Australia to be foreign. There is just no middle ground on that. Heading "home" will be a good thing to do, but I would still wait a year or so. Why? Because the more time goes by, the more you adapt to Australia, but the more you can from a distance and new perspective appreciate what Edinburgh is. That will make abundantly clear to you if Edinburgh is a place where you want to return full time, or whether you would prefer to call Australia home, and visit Edinburgh on an occasional basis. Like for weddings. My brother is in Edinburgh, has been ever since we moved there from Australia. Sister in the Borders. I may visit them once in 5 years, and that is plenty. I always view the airport in Turnhouse or Heathrow as the place where I return home to Australia. I view Scotland as a beautiful place to visit occasionally, if there is a good reason, but I much prefer to go to Singapore, Thailand or Hong Kong for my holidays. Or Japan. I could go on - Scotland is not a main destination nor a place where my heart says I have to be. And that is your problem - your heart is not focused on where you really want to be. This needs to get fixed. Going to Edinburgh might help you get that focus.

I am a GP. When I refer, I do a mental health care plan, and refer to a psychologist. You get a number of free sessions, or subsidised, but that quickly runs out. I have a problem with psychologists in general, in that many of them are plainly loopy. I love psychology, but am careful about which psychologists I refer to, as I find that some patients have the psychologists own problems compounded into their own issues. So simply getting a name is, for me, less happy - I like to get feedback from the patient. How is this helping you? Are you on the same page, do you feel you are getting the right "vibes" from this person? It may be that there is a game going on with the psychologist, who needs a steady source of income - see me in 2 weeks and we will continue. The psychological issues become permanent. Finding a psychologist could be as simple as checking with the Medicare Local for her area. But you still will be half a world away from getting real information. It will not simply be a matter of "how much" but "who" and "why" and "is it helping" - and you are going to be cut off from that. Might I suggest that you try reversing the problem. Suggest that you are happy yo pay for a school trip. Get the school to liaise with you, and you can see what kind of expenses she is really incurring from school trips. If you go with paying for a psychologist, you are really condemning yourself to being out of control. Managing the expenses for school trips puts you in control. Your ex will hate the idea.

So your main beef is that you don't want to fork out money for an Australian passport. Cool. The other issues in your mini-rantette can then be ignored. Do as you will.

It has nothing to do with a stamp. It is just the same for the UK - for a dual national, you will enter/leave with a UK passport, and enter/leave Australia with an Australian passport. But having looked at your rant, I would be happier if you stayed out of Australia. Try France.

No. You are still NOT an Australian citizen - that event occurs as soon as you have taken your pledge of allegiance at the citizenship ceremony. So you still are under your current visa, you can travel freely, but need to use your current passport, and enter via the foreign citizen entry lines at immigration. Your travel plans can continue uninterrupted. The only issue might be travelling at the time of your ceremony - so call the shire to see when your attendance is planned for. You can delay the ceremony if you will be travelling during that time.

we installed evaporative aircon into our house just last November. Did without as we saw no reason, and no great suffering, but want to sell the house in the not-too-distant future, so thinking of resale value. As a youngster here in Perth we never had aircon, never knew what it was. We all did just fine. BTW, golf in 35C can be a bit trying, but it does not stop me. 40C is a bit much, so I wait until the evening temperatures. Just got to love life in Perth!

Give Australia a go? What do you think this is - a moonlight flit to a neighbouring village? You are going to be moving to a foreign country on the other side of the world, with different homes, attitudes, climates (note the plural), politics, TV, food, lifestyle. The money will be tight for a while, you will be away from friends and family. Emigrating is a serious business, that must be undertaken with vision, determination and courage - you will have hurdles that demand to be surmounted, or you ping pong and turn tail, losing your money and your confidence. At the very least, you need a partner who is convinced, heart and soul, mind and body, that this is a marvellous idea and well worth the effort you must put into it.

Missed meeting you all - was feeling the lack, but glad to hear you had a great time!

... sorry to admit that I am called - by she who must be obeyed - to an alternative venue tomorrow. I was looking forward very much to seeing many of you there. But I would rather not face the consequences of contradicting the font of all command.

Un-PC again. Not married, so the relationship is easier broken - less security in the relationship for both. Your partner is not invested in your parents as much, and you are less invested in his life. Assuming you feel morally bonded together in a relationship at least as good as a divorceable marriage however, your partner is going to be: 1. uncertain of your commitment to him 2. doubt in his ability to continue in the purchase of the house as a couple 3. fearful of financial consequences 4. in grief at likely loss of his partner 5. filled with anger at being placed in such a situation 6. filled with a sense of helplessness, as you flit to and fro sending messages of temporariness of the relationship 7. lonely in the face of bilateral miscommunication and without a solid group of bonded friends in the foreign country he has viewed as his new permanent home It may be a very difficult situation for you, but then again it a difficult situation for the both of you, and I do not see the recognition of that difficulty for him in your approach - I may be wrong, but it seems to be one of "I have a massive problem, this is what I have to do, and you should be fully behind me." Of course, I know it is not that clear cut, but once again, I ask that you consider very carefully what your partner is feeling. If you both love each other, you will both be able to speak about the pain you are both feeling, and find a resolution. Some temporal solutions have been suggested. From the financial side, glibly saying you could just about absorb chucking 10% of the house cost away is just silly. More than silly - reckless, dumb. I strongly suspect that you thought of that as a short term solution to your immediate problem, which tells me that you are thinking in panic mode, not with a fully functioning reasoning centre. So - if that is the case, then stop whatever you are doing right now. Your brain is not processing appropriately. Any decision you make now is likely to be a mistake. Let things settle, communicate openly and honestly, and see if you cannot find a reasonable solution to the financial side - such as renting out, and turning it into an investment property as a couple, or letting a soon-to-be ex-partner discover ways of affording this as an investment property on his own. Take the same approach for every decision - step back, get some clear air, and communicate.

Pity - I would have loved to get to know you better.

OK - I understand you are in turmoil just now, but I am an un-PC person, so bear with me. You have just told your husband that he is not your immediate family. You have also made clear to him that you are prepared to leave him in the lurch financially and socially, to be with your immediate family. How is he going to feel? And how do you feel about it when expressed like this. As said above, there is no reason for this to be an either or situation. The scars you are leaving behind in your relationship are, however, of a lasting nature. Please - for your sake and that of your husband, have a think about this.

I was 16 when we were taken from Australia to Scotland. The first school was a disaster, but that was only for a few months, until we got settled in Edinburgh. All went well, I settled into Scottish life, went to university, and left the UK as soon as possible thereafter. To be honest, I probably managed better academically because of the challenge - I had to do 4 years of biology in one year for the O Grades, and it went well with the focus. I can easily imagine another boy would not have been as happy, but that is what a parent needs to assess ... I do recall feeling totally lost in the UK, as I stood at the top of a hill with my skateboard under my arm, and no-one to skate with. I had then, as now, absolutely no interest in anything involving soccer, but coming first in the swimming carnival was a novelty - the UK children seemed to have no idea how to swim. It was all different. Some I was happy with, some I hated, but I got on with it, we had no choice. I hold no grudges against my parents - they did what they felt necessary. It broadened me, and I grew into a better, more balanced person. Different. But I am much happier to be back in Australia - wild horses would not drag me to the UK for anything more than a short visit. Your son may do as he wishes after he has left study and started his own life. Make this an adventure, let him develop, and all will be well, wherever he goes.

You want to move to the other side of the world, disrupt your current comfortable life, leave your mother (who is happy to psychologically blackmail you, but you still need to be close to her) and spend a huge amount of money, and you do not have a firm desire/intent/passion to make the move? In a word - stay. Before you make the move, be very sure that this is not just a wish - a "nice to do" type of thing, a "maybe yes, maybe no" approach - that way lies failure. Make this a want, a deep desire, a passion that must be requited. It still may not work out, but you will have given it an excellent shot from the very outset.

I see where you are coming from, but no. There is a difference between the caring for a baby - mother really should be with baby, father really should be providing. Older children - there needs to be a division of work in the caring for a child. But that is not what this is a bout. A relationship is not dependent on time spent with each other, it is about the work we put in developing the love for each other, the respect, the path together as a couple. If that breaks down, the children suffer badly. From a psychological perspective, the relationship between the couple is the primary relationship, from which all else hangs. The lack of understanding for this principle is probably behind much of the current societal misery.