Nohea

Hi wendee originally we had planned to go to Brisbane as I have family there, I have no family left in the uk and my oh just has his mum and dad ( this is who our eldest son is staying with) but all the family in Brisbane wanted to move away and all split, back to different states and countries, so the pull of family being around was no longer there, so we decided to look at other states, we liked the look of Adelaide also but thought we would try Perth for climate, family parks etc. work and just thought it might suit our family, were not into city living and live the quiet life in a small town, our lives revolve around the children and their sporting activities, we have no close family or friends in the uk, we just tend to socialise with other parents From sport clubs and school, I do worry about being isolated but think its the unfamiliarity of the whole thing I'm finding quite daunting as back home I prefer my own company, but I suppose it's nice to know that if I do fancy meeting up with a friend I can just txt, where as starting fresh here will take work and effort to find friends and people to socialise with, my husband is not phased in the slightest, he's too laid back, I'm the worrier!

We flew Singapore airlines and when I booked I ordered a special baby meal for our 14 month old. When we were on the plane we never got offered any food for the children, and myself and my husband both missed a meal as we took it in turns to hold the baby and were told a meal had been saved both times, but it turned out both times it hadnt, when I asked for food I was just really ignored, and because it was quite stressful with the baby crying the whole way and being ill I didn't really chase it until the last leg from Singapore to Perth, I did say could the children please get a meal as they hadn't eaten a proper meal for over a day, the cabin crew person then said it wasn't possible as he was in charge of children's meals and special order meals and he didn't have us down on his list for any children's meals what so ever, after letting him know how unhappy we were he found her a chicken breast fillet from business class, it was just plain and cold and she wouldn't touch it, bearing in mind she's only got 4 teeth as well! Although he was unable to answer my question as to why our 12 yr old wasn't offered a meal even though we had paid adult fare for him! He also said that if we wanted meals on the return journey we would need to go to the desk when we got off the plane and make sure that the meals were ordered, with all the stress of the journey and landing at Perth at midnight we totally forgot to do this, so I'm hoping we can sort something out at the airport before we leave, and also try and stock up on snacks. when we get back to the uk I will be complaining! we had problems with our hire car also, no sat nav as ordered so it took us 4 hours to find our rental, landed at midnight, arrived at the rental at 4 am, with starving, ill, crying kids, our journey really was a nightmare, trying to be positive, our return journey cannot be any worse

That would make sense, I don't know anything about state sponsored, we are here on a 175 so I only ever really looked into that type of visa, I needed it to be 175 in case we wanted to try different states, we've been pleasantly surprised by Perth so far ( maybe I read too many Perth hating posts before we left!) i also expected it to be more expensive, Which has also been a pleasant surprise

Thank you that's ok then, I would have hated to have got home and not have validated, the journey here was hell with a crying baby non stop for 12 hours, and no food for the children on the plane as they didn't have enough! We're here I think another week ( I've list all track of day, date and time) it's probably not helped that the children have all been ill with coughs and colds, so not getting a lot of sleep at the moment.

Hi just here trying to do more research on Perth, areas, schools,jobs, money, housing etc. the usual I suppose for anyone thinking of making the big move i've just come across a post on visa validation talking about someone going into Perth cbd to get a visa sticker in their passport for validation, now I'm wondering have I actually validated my visa?? All I did was enter the country the same as everyone else who arrived on our plane, and have someone look at our passports, and put a stamp on one of the pages, just as they would do if we were here on a tourist visa, is this right or not? Have we validated, sorry for the stupid question but I never really questioned myself until reading about going to the cbd for a visa sticker. This is our first time in Perth, and I feel although I've been researching for 5 years that its all kind of worthless, and things are not at all what I imagined them to be, we don't know anyone at all here so finding it hard to know how to find out info, what's important and what's not, the person who owns the holiday rental we are staying in has given my husband some tips on things he did wrong like not getting medical insurance in time etc. my husband was lacking to him for ages, when he came back in the house and I asked what did he say, he couldn't remember! If anyone has any advice at all I would be greatful, my plan was to come here, validate, learn as much as I could then go back to the uk and decide if its what we really want or not, because we applied in 2007 our lîves have changed a lot and the decisions aren't so easy, my eldest son who is 16 did not want to validate his visa as he is certain he never wants to come to Perth, to live or holiday, he was only 11 at the start of our process so things were very different, just very confused with it all at the moment, and feel a bit clueless :biggrin:

Thanks Fiona, when do they usually start? I thought we would be ok on the beach but they were there as well, I will def get some tea tree, we went on our bike ride but had to buy a net for our head £44!! Lol, also looked like complete idiots but what a relief to not have them crawling in swarms all over your face and in your ears when your trying to steer a bike, I've never been anywhere in the world and experienced flies like this, we definitely weren't prepared for them

Is there any good spray or cream you can buy to repel the flies? Everywhere we go there seems to be swarms following us, my baby has them in her eyes and all over her in the stroller, we tried a bike ride earlier and couldn't do it the were so many flies in our faces, is there this many flies all the time? Are some areas worse than others? I've read a lot in the past about annoying flies but never for a minute thought they could be so bad or ruin your day, thought it was just people moaning over nothing, but it really is unbearable, and so is my moaning about it to my husband, :smile: