Ramblingrosie

It's going well thanks! It's the same job he was doing in the UK for the parent company and he's got several colleagues out here who he has worked with before, so he's slotting right in. The company wives have been helpful and welcoming to me too and I knew a couple from before. Tell you another thing that are cheaper here -Apple products. My husband has just gone out to buy himself a new iMac and it's about a third cheaper than in the UK. Rosie, x

Coming back to this having been here for about a month and I have to say that it's not quite so expensive as I thought it would be. In the UK, we spent about £140 on food in our weekly shop and here we're spending about $230 which is quite a bit less than I was expecting (I was budgeting $350). It may be worth noting that I tend to cook from scratch and use reusable nappies, but I did that in the UK too. The season tickets that we have bought to a couple of places seem comparable to the UK as well. The school fees for the children are being paid by the company, but they are SUPER cheap compared to UK private schools. Clothes are probably a bit more expensive here, but fuel is cheaper than the UK. The gyms are cheaper here and childcare at the gym is absolute peanuts compared to the UK (where it cost me £10 and hour per child to put them in, here it is $2.50 per child per hour). It is expensive to grab a cup of tea (for me) and some biscuits for the kids at the parks, so now I just take a couple of bottles of (tap) water and a packet of oreos with us and jobs a good'un. I suspect that eating out, drinking alcohol and going to the cinema are probably pricey, but with 4 children under 7, I have precious little chance to do any of those anyway! We're more likely to invite friends around for a BBQ instead. I think maybe some people are underestimating exactly how fast the cost of living has risen in the UK in the last few years, our food bill was just going up and up and up before we left and most wages seemed to be stagnating. Maybe it was just because we were based in the South within reach of London, but we were 13 junctions down the M4, so 40 mins drive to the outskirts and hardly close. We didn't leave the UK because we didn't like it, or to go somewhere cheap, or for a better standard of life etc, we left because we were posted out on assignment. Now we're here though it doesn't seem to be anywhere near as expensive as we thought it would be and we're enjoying the good bits of being here. Rosie, x

Hi, I haven't posted in a while as we've been somewhat busy moving! We're here all safe and sound - the flights from the UK with a 6 year old, 4 year old, 3 year old and 19 month old were pretty good - the older three were angelic and the baby could have been much worse! We're in a serviced apartment in Brisbane CBD while we wait to move into a house we have rented in Cannon Hill. We've found a private school that will keep the older two in their English years as opposed to dropping them down (they're August babies). First impressions are that the winter weather is great, the playgrounds are superb and the locals are very welcoming and friendly. Brisbane itself is clean and compact. The food at the supermarket is not as expensive as I thought it would be (some stuff, like chicken breast, is definitely cheaper than the UK), but money runs through your fingers when you are out and about! The ferries in Brisbane are great fun for the kids - we got Go cards on our second day. My husband checked out the Medicare service at A&E last week after he dropped a knife on his foot and the resulting cut needed gluing - he was pretty impressed. He also managed last minute tickets to the Lions match I'm aware that we're in the honeymoon period of settling and so we're viewing it all through rose-tinted glasses, but as I was ambivalent about coming in the first place, we're off to a good start! Rosie, x

Do you know, that's actually a pretty good point. We had the very shocking news on Wednesday night, that my husband's 52 year old aunt had died suddenly. She had been playing tennis, had a funny turn and just dropped dead. She was fit and healthy, had a healthy lifestyle and yet has been snatched from us very suddenly. They will have to do a post mortum but all I can think of is that she had a brain aneurism, which can happen to anyone. Sorry to suddenly be morbid - it would have been difficult to deal with at any point, but when we are 2 weeks away from moving countries, it's been a bit of a blow.

Thank you so much for your replies - I'd never even considered haggling in Australia! Something I would do without even thinking in India or Thailand! Fortunately my nappies are reusable (having 4 children in just over 5 years would have been extortionate otherwise!), so I don't have to calculate that and we're not big drinkers (who wants to look after small children with a hangover?!). I can see it's going to take me some time to get into the swing of things over there! ​xx

And THAT is good advice I've lived all over the world, from Africa, to the Caribbean, to the Indian subcontinent, to SE Asia and I am looking forward to checking out Australia and the area that surrounds it. There is, for me, no place quite like home, but it's fun looking for one.

Oh dearie me, I really must stop being so terribly naive then :-p My friends/family who have been to Australia (and I throw my hands up in the air and admit that I haven't) have all commented on the quality of the fruit and veg. Now maybe they just don't shop at Waitrose like I do Dahling, but it does seem to be a running theme. Having never been to Australia and having agreed to go without a looksee, I have bugger all idea of what I will find when I get there, but I suspect that I will find good bits and bad bits like I have in the many countries I have lived in. People told me that I'd love the quality of the food in Italy - and I did, the Italian bits of it. Woe betide anyone who wanted to eat any other food though... I've not been on this forum long at all, but people really do seem to get terribly het up about simple questions.

Ah, ok, thanks that is helpful! This is the joy of being posted to a country rather than chosing to go and live there of your own accord, I know nothing!

Phew, finally trawled to the end of this thread, which has been quite amusing in places! Ghostgirl, funny that you should ask as people keep saying, "Oh Australia, the weight will just drop off!" and I have my doubts. Here in the UK, I have (ok "had" because they went to their new homes last week) 2 dogs and 2 horses to keep me fit - regardless of the weather the dogs needed walking and the horses needed mucking out/seeing to. I think I am less likely to exercise in the heat than I am in the cold. We are hoping to get out on our bikes more, but that will take the place of walking the dogs rather than being any new exercise, because I do a lot of my day to day travel on foot here (school runs etc). Here in the UK it's really easy to just tog the kids up in waterproofs and wellies and go down to the woods to play in the streams, and we're semi-rural, so I think we will rely on the parks in Oz much more than we do here. I have been told that they are great though, so fingers crossed on that one. I eat fairly healthily apart from the large amount of chocolate - cooking from scratch normally, making sure at least a third of everything I eat is fruit/veg etc etc. The good things that I have heard about Australia is that the fruit and veg is better quality, and they don't have English Cadburys (I know, I know, Australia has Cadburys too, but having tried it many a time in India, I just don't like it as much, which is A Good Thing), but I eat a fair amount of fruit and veg anyway. So, as another poster said, I don't think that there is anything magical about moving, but if you do exercise and eat healthily, then you'll probably stay healthy. I have put on a LOT of weight in the last few months in the run up to this move (I stress eat - I know it's not good, but moving 4 children under 7, the eldest of whom has Aspergers, and a house full of stuff to Australia, whilst rehoming all of animals here has proved a step too far for my healthy eating bit - oh, and drinking our booze cabinet before we leave hasn't helped matters either :0)). ​Rosie, x

We're not coming out with the intention of staying - we'll be there for 3/4 years, exploring the area and then we'll move on to the next posting. I think we'll feel the pull back to the UK after the next posting as 6 years away from home is probably long enough in one stretch. The world is an amazing place to explore and see, but the pull of home is pretty strong too.

​So it looks like my sums are about right then - thank you. xx

One emigrates from a country and immigrates into another. I shall be emigrating from the UK and immigrating into Australia (although I'm not sure it counts as it's only for 3 years). I'm not sure our reasons for emigrating are the RIGHT ones necessarily, but we're moving because it's what we do - I've been an expat most of my life and grew up as a 3KK. We've been in the Uk now for over 3 years and are a little bored. We're looking forward to exploring a part of the world that we have never visited and also to introducing our children to travel as a way of broadening the mind. I have no doubt that I will be horribly homesick for a while, but I'll get over it soon enough. In my mind, the wrong reason to move away is to fix something that is broken. So to move overseas because you think it will help your relationship for example. Moving is stressful, even when you are a strong couple/family unit. Things tend to break under stress rather than harden.

Hi all, We're being posted to Brisbane by my husband's company at the end of this month, and I was just curious as to the cost of living. I know that it is high is Australia, but fortunately most of the expenses (car, house, bills) will be taken care of by the company, so we're just looking at having to pay fuel, food, clothes and fun stuff. Am I right to assume that this will be 2-3 times the cost that it would be in the UK as has been suggested to me? For example, at the moment, to feed my family of 6 well, but not extravagantly, costs about £700 ($1050?) a month - is it going to cost $2-3k a month to feed a family of 6? Does that sound too high? Too low? About right? I appreciate that you must be asked these questions ALL the time, so thanks to anyone who does take the time to answer them for me ​Rosie, x

​Thank you! That's really helpful info

​Thanks A - I am so unprepared with knowing anything about Brisbane yet. I'll try and see if I can work out how to drop you a PM!

Hi, We're flying out on the 1st June, doing it pretty direct (which is going to be great fun with 4 under 7, not). Feeling a bit nervous at the moment, but sure it will be fine! I think the apartment will be pretty central so that my husband can walk to work, but then I think we may move to the clay fields/ascot/hamilton area, but it really depends on schools. How are your preparations going? I think we're pretty much there now, house here let, car sold, animals rehomed, notice given to schools etc. Visas came through last week and flights are hopefully being booked today. Just got lots of organising for the packers now!

Phew, there I was thinking I was being totally profligate! We do keep an eye on where our money goes, but we don't need to hold on to it too hard. We're moving with the company that my husband has worked for for about 12 years and they haven't made a habit of screwing us over, so I'm hoping they're not about to start now I'm assuming that it will cost us 2-3x the amount that it costs us here to live out there, but most of those expenses (house, car, household bills) are taken care of by the company, so we are just really looking at feeding and clothing ourselves, putting fuel in the car and activities. They are significantly increasing his salary and we are also letting our house here. He's in oil and gas, which I gather is a bit of a boom industry in Oz right now!

Thanks, I think we will definitely discuss it with the school. If we were going to be in Oz permanently, then I'd have no qualms at all about them dropping down a year - I think it would be better for them - it's just the move back that makes it hard.

I'm not sure how the kids will be - the eldest was only 3 and a bit when we moved back from India. The Boy was only 15 months, so had no idea what was going on and number 3 was still in my tummy! They are all, except for the baby, very excited about the move and it's hard trying to keep them calm, especially as the eldest has mild aspergers. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous, especially about schooling as the older two will have to drop a year when they come out and then may struggle to go back into their UK years when we return. Also I just saw a picture of a spider eating a snake, not sure I'm ready for the creepy crawlies...

Thanks for your help, both of you - The Eldest's teacher did suggest that it might be possible, but I wondered if anyone had actually done it. The matter is slightly complicated by her having mild Aspergers. They will be going into a private school in Brisbane and I had wondered whether to see if they could stay in the same years as they are now, but I think they may struggle with that socially. The littler ones will be ok because they will stay in the same year group (being a january and an october birth), even if they are a few months behind. I had looked into a montessouri because the year groups are more fluid, but I think that she's too old to start at one of those now. Oh well, what will be will be!

No idea yet! They're putting us up in a serviced apartment for the first couple of months until our shipment arrives. I have some friends out there who work for the same company (we've been on other postings together) and they have suggested Clayfields and the surrounding areas, but it really depends on schools as I don't want to spend hours each day commuting with the children. I've been focussing so much on the logistics of the actual move that I haven't given much thought to what we will do when we actually get there! The company take pretty good care of us though and I moved to India without a Looksee, so figure I can probably do the same with Australia

Hi everyone, We're moving to Brisbane at the end of the month - me, my husband and our 4 children (girl 6, boy 4, girl 3, girl 1). It's a 3 year posting with his current company and it seems to have all moved rather swiftly since he had the job offer 6 weeks ago. All the visas are through, the packers are booked etc we're just waiting on flights being booked and they are supposed to be doing that this week for a move on the 1st June. It won't be our first posting, we've been in Italy and India before, so I'm used to packing everything up, but this time we had settled a little deeply after 3 and a half years in one place and I had to rehome our animals too which has been a bit heart breaking. Looking forward to the Aussie lifestyle for a few years now though and hope to make plenty of new friends out there - who knows, it might become a permanent move if we like it enough! ​Rosie, x

Hi, We're moving to Brisbane at the end of this month - we're a family of 6, (girl 6, boy 4, girl 3, girl 18months). Not sure where we're going to be living yet as we're moving into a serviced apartment in the first instance, but it would be nice to have some friendly faces around ​Rosie, x

Hi everyone, A slightly odd question as we haven't even moved out to Australia yet! We are heading out to Brisbane on a 3 year posting at the end of the month with our 4 children. My older two (who are in year 2 and reception here) are both August babies (I'm sure I can still refer to them as babies despite being 6 and 4!) and are both going to end up dropping a year in Australia because of the ways the years there fall and I was wondering if anyone had moved back to the UK and been able to keep them in the Australian years? Does that even make sense to anyone? ​Rosie, x

Thank you, but I am in the very fortunate position of not having to really budget - the expat deal that we have been offered in Oz is very good. We're moving out because we're being sent rather than from any particular desire to live in Australia (although I am very much looking forward to it now). It may be worth noting for budgeting in the UK that food prices in the UK have stormed up in the last 3 and a half years since we moved back (from India). It used to be that I could get the weekly groceries for under £120, now we're lucky if they come in under £150, and then I leave a bit extra in the budget for the times we pop out for a pint (or 6) of milk or a loaf of bread and come back with tasty treats that we (and certainly my waist line) don't really need. The car insurance IS high - as I pointed out I had no "no claims", partly because I hadn't been living in the UK long and partly because I reversed my car into another (totally my fault, didn't believe the sensors and didn't see the small car below my sight line). Also the house insurance may be high because I lost my engagement ring a couple of years ago and then a pipe burst in our bathroom and flooded the house whilst we were away... BUT, we do live in a low crime area which would probably bring it down a bit.