1 year on
I can't believe that I just typed one year, where on Earth has it gone? But really we have been here for over a year and as I have just finished work and have a small amount of time before the arrival of our first bundle of joy I thought I would use the opportunity to catch everyone up on our events in the first year. It has been an up and down year, but we have truly been lucky to have more positives than negatives. By the time November 2010 arrived my OH has secured a new job and he is absolutely loving it. He does travel more than he used to in the UK but with that as the only downside we really can't complain. What he likes the most is that he has a boss who knows how to say well done, these would of been dirty words at his last company and also that the work life balance is so much better. I though as a primary teacher have struggled a little more. With some guidance I was able to get onto the relivers circuit and actually this has worked out the best thing for me once we knew I was pregnant but it has been hard not to work full time when i've done nothing but since I left universtity. It has been a steep learning curve but a positive and now my name is known I hope that once I want to go back to work I will be able to find some more permeant but teaching and aplying for jobs in NZ personally has been harder than I ever thought it would be, especially as schools here seem more unwilling to accept overseas references and I am still ot get my head around what a NZ teaching CV should look like.
The home front was much easier. We got a great rental for the first six months and although the owners put the place on the market and we had to deal with all the estate agent rubbish, it kick started us into finding our own home. We have been realy lucky and found our perfect home in the location we wanted at a price we could afford, and we lucked out with the exchange rate as well so someone must have been looking down on us. I was amazed at how much simplier it was to buy a home here than in the UK and we got some great advice from people on which solicitors and surveyors etc. to use.
So did we make the right decision? Personally yes. I truly believe that we would not be having a family so quickly were we not so settled and happy. We are really pleased to be bringing a new kiwi into the world and I can't wait to share with him all the amazing things we have around us. Do I miss the UK? No I don't. I miss some of my friends and my family but the phone and skype and facebook make the world smaller these days and we have been lucky enough to have family come and visit since we arrived. In fact my Mum is here now to be with me for the next grandchild, I couldn't ask for more. I won't say we will never got back and visit, one day we will but right now i'm looking forward to seeing more of new country.
I do miss some things. Decent tea bags for one and my husband longs to buy Ambrosia custard more than the once a month treat that I allow him. TV and the adverts related to them annoy me, and although I do like rugby and the countdown co-insides with my due date the countdown has got a bit boring in recent times. I also realise that living in a smaller country means less competition between shops and so prices are higher in some areas than we are used to. If we had realised we would of used some the space left over in our container to bring a load of B&Q insualtion for the loft!
Overall, this has been a great year and we so made the right decision to move to New Zealand. This is just us though and I realise that we have been blessed with how things have fallen into place. We have had to work at it and at times that has been frustrating, but looking back it was well worth it, we really do consider ourselves as kiwis now and look forward to being here for the rest of our lives.
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