Category Archives: Life in the UK

Who’s Gonna Drive You Home?

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Last August, I relinquished a part of my life that I was inordinately attached to…my car.  Apart from working in London and using this city’s quite amazing PT system every day, financial pressures meant that it was time to let it go.  And so it was with a heavy heart that I handed over the keys and began the daily face-off with my vacant off-street parking space.

It was inconvenient at first but I soon discovered a joy in being able to experience the world rather than it whizz by un-noticed.  For the most part, being out in the weather was invigorating: crunching through the snow, smelling the rain, feeling the sun on my face and breathing in the elements.  After a few months, my knees ached less and my legs took on a much greater supporting role as my body changed shape and my fitness improved – recently I even found myself trotting spiritedly up the steps to the train platform.  And if you read this blog regularly you’ll know that commuting allows me to indulge in one of my favourite things to do every day – read.  You can’t do that in the car!

But the biggest delight has been keeping quietly to itself and waiting for Spring to arrive and now its here, I find myself inspired by blue skies, green fields and the awakening trees that makes England’s prettiest time of year…well, really pretty…

I was walking home from the train station when I was struck by this beauty

And this tree is about to burst into bloom

Then I was walking to Kingston today and noticed this gorgeous wisteria draping itself possessively over a number of houses in the street…

And so, still feeling inspired after a visit to the Oxfam bookshop to top up my commuting bookshelf, a bout of fruit and veg shopping at the Market Square and a leisurely toastie and soya cappuccino at a local cafe, I bought myself a little flowery inspiration…

…say hi to Gerry the Geranium!

Gerry is one of a pair (the other is Gerri with an ‘i’) and tomorrow we will find the perfect pot (and indeed the perfect spot) for the two of them to bring a little touch of Spring to Chez Hamer.

Hot To Trot…Maybe Not

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Well, here we are at the 10th of April already, we have just enjoyed two weeks of glorious weather here in Ol’ Blighty and there’s been a whole lot of blue skies, sunshine, short sleeves and bare legs around.

Sitting at my front window watching my washing drying happily (bet you didn’t know washing could be happy) and listening to the birds singing and the bees bouncing (there is a massive hairy bee trying to get in through my closed window – right next to the open door – he’s not the sharpest tool in the shed, this bee), I wondered how my kith and kin were faring on the under other side of the world.  Facebook updates of late have not been full of sunshine to say the least.

Upon investigation (it’s Sunday and I am avoiding ironing by finding such things as this to keep me ‘busy’), I have discovered that Melbourne (where I hail from) is looking forward to drizzle and a top temperature of 17C…it is April and my home-town is about halfway through its Autumnal segue into Winter so this is not unexpected.

But London’s temperatures have soared (okay so I use the term a little loosely) into the 20s this week and this unexpected burst of ‘hot’ weather not only upset my ‘what-to-wear-to-work’ planning (summer-y items get packed away for the Winter – much like a family of bears – in a suitcase or in the ironing – not the bears you understand, they are probably in a cave somewhere) but also played havoc with yesterday’s Grand National field at Aintree. 

Today we are set to reach 19C (and 21C tomorrow)…

– which is more than Melbourne…and Adelaide…and Canberra! And is alarmingly close to Sydney’s 22C…

Truly a moment for we Aussies (from those southern states anyway) to savour…

Until it all comes to a screeching halt on Tuesday with a forecast top of 12C…hmmm perhaps I’ll wait a little longer to unpack/iron those summer threads.

Expat: Born or bred?

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On one of my especially long commutes home this week (3hrs!) I stumbled across a blog, Adventures in Expat Land by ‘accompanying wife’ Linda from The Netherlands.  As I sat on the top deck of the number 14 bus (having been ejected from King’s Cross Station after a ‘reported emergency’ with the rest of London’s peak-hour commuters and then walking 20mins to get on said bus), her post Seven Reasons Not To Become An Expat struck a chord…

It can be fun. And exciting, educational, eye-opening, energizing, amazing. It can also be uprooting, disruptive, alienating, challenging, lonely and just plain hard work.

I knew no-one here and had no job (just some leftover redundancy package money) but buoyed by fierce determination and an unrelenting belief that it was where I was meant to be, I packed up my comfortable Melbourne life and started again. Just like I did many times over as we moved up and down the east coast of Australia and around Melbourne, changing schools, jobs, friends, creating new habits and leaving the comfortable predictability of old ones.

But then so did my sister…who stays happily ensconced in Australia with not so much as a twinkle of expat life in her eye.

Which then leads me to wonder whether an expat is ‘born’ a nomad rather than being a product of their upbringing.  You know, nature vs nurture and all that.  Bit like a personality flaw trait.

So are expats actually born or bred?  And what’s the difference between those that up sticks and settle somewhere else vs the constantly relocating expatriate lifer?

Does anyone know?
ps…and if you even have a inkling that you might like to try on ‘expat life’, you should read Linda’s post for yourself by clicking here…or not…

Lost In Translation

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When I first moved to the UK, my direct approach (or if you prefer, my ‘Australian bluntness’) resulted in a quite a few hackles-on-the-rise, particularly at work.  Seven years on, I like to think I have learned to play a little more by the rules – or at the very least, understand the boundaries before pushing firmly, but ever so charmingly, against them.

I was going through my mail from the week yesterday and, noticing that British fashion brand Boden had sent their new Spring/Summer catalog in tabloid format, thought I’d have a quick flick through.  Imagine my surprise when I stumbled across a full-page guide to navigating the ‘English’ language (I tried to scan it in for you but it was too big/my scanner is too small).  Let me just say that HOURS of angst and general hair-tearing could have been avoided if I had only known:

…that when the English say ‘It was quite good’
     what they mean is ‘I was mildly disappointed’.

…and when they say ‘I was a bit disappointed that…’
     what they mean is ‘I am most upset and cross.’

…also that when the English say ‘I’ll bear it in mind’
     what they mean is ‘I will do nothing about it.’

…and when they say ‘I’m sure it’s my fault’
     what they mean is ‘we both know it’s your fault.’

…and very importantly, from a work standpoint,
    when they say ‘Could we consider some other options?’,
     they don’t actually want more of your input,
     what they mean is ‘I have a much better idea than yours.’

Kerching!!!
(I am reliably informed that this is actually the sound of a penny dropping). 

Do you realise that this list could transform English relationships with the rest of the world?  Seriously, it should be incorporated into some sort of Welcome Pack, guiding foreign dignitaries through the seething mass lying just beneath those polite English manners and helping we who are ‘just-off-the’boat’ to get the ‘lay of the land’.

Now THAT would be ‘the dog’s bollocks’!

Commuting Gems…A Veritable Treasure Trove

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Fave freebie commuting mag Stylist was a veritable treasure trove this week.

This cushion got my stamp of approval (sorry, couldn’t resist!)…

I tore out this recipe…

(Skye just won the Qantas Australian Woman of the Year in the UK Award and is the Head Chef at Michelin-starred Petersham Nurseries.)

I agreed (for the most part) with Lucy Mangan’s 5 useful questions for the census…

(FYI: the response to Qs 1, 3 and 5 is Eeeeeewwwww!! Qs 2 and 4 are under advisement)

…but what I was really searching for was this:

And after perusing said list, what do you think my first thought was?  

‘Hey I’ve only seen 22 of them! Best I take this list home for future reference.’

Just what is it about a ‘Bucket List’ that makes one feel unread / uncultured / unadventurous / unproductive?

The great bake-off sputters to life

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It’s been 6 months between ‘bakes’ but my second foray has been a resounding success.

After returning from Australia having spent 2 weeks over Christmas with family and food in abundance, I have been waiting for a chilly Sunday afternoon to cook this delicious fruit cake for myself (I’ve decided baking is best on afternoons when it’s cold outside!)  And this last weekend was D-Day…

Mango Fruit Cake 1

Scrumptious, super-easy and no-added-sugar. Feel free to snaffle the recipe (below) for yourself. Believe me, your guests/ friends/ hangers-on will be impressed…

Bon Appetit!

Mango Fruit Cake recipe

London…On The Cheap(side)…

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I had lunch with some great friends of mine today who moved to the UK permanently two and half years ago. We were chatting about how long it takes to feel ‘settled’ and they reminded me that, in their early expat days, I had said to them that it took me somewhere between 18 months to two years before I’d started to feel like I had actually ‘built’ a life for myself versus the feeling of being a long staying tourist.

Did I really say that?  I can’t really remember…

But what I do remember is my initial shock at how expensive things were and a big part of feeling ‘settled’ for me was finding ways to do things cheaply – most expats in the UK can reel off a whole variety of discount ‘opportunities’ – and I soon learned that if you look hard enough, there are lots of ways to do this.

For example, today’s lunch included a 50% discount off the food bill and was booked through toptable…and my travel to our fab foodie feast was courtesy of Oystercard (which almost halves the bus fare).  I have also booked a 70min massage for a few weeks time through Groupon at a whopping 66% off and I have had countless 2-for-1 meals with friends using vouchers from newspapers like the Metro, email newsletters (Giraffe, gbk and Pizza Express are particular faves) and voucher websites like vouchercloud and vouchers.co.uk.

So the key to London ‘on the cheap’ is this – Sign up for as many things as you can.  You may fill your inbox to overflowing but when it comes to getting the deals, it really is a numbers game.

And you can also rest assured in the knowledge that you’ll never go hungry – if all else fails, supermarket-brand baked beans are only 19p a can!

Ker-ching!

ps…for you Londoners that might be interested in some terrific Turkish fare, get yourself down to Cirrik in Richmond…via toptable of course!

The Language Barrier…Mind The Gap!

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I’ve lived here in the UK for just over 7 years now.  I came from another English-speaking country – a colony of the British Empire no less, built on the entrepreneurial and criminal exploits of those shipped in from the Mother Country.

And I have spent a not insignificant proportion of my time explaining passing comments, pithy retorts and ironic witticisms that lose their essential meaning when transported to the other side of the world.

The comment that sparked it all off 7 years ago was this:

I went for a fossick on your desk.

I had presumed that fossick was a word in use in everyday English language but clearly not.  And I found myself, flush-faced, explaining to the wide-eyed recipient of said comment that it meant to rummage about for something, using all of the relevant Aussie ‘looking for gold’-isms I could think of! 

I am secretly quite proud that I haven’t yet fallen for the whole ‘I was walking to work today and my pants got wet’ gaffe (for those non-English people out there, pants are underpants here) but there have been a few faux pas including thongs and vests (both also undergarments) and a few smiles/sniggers/raised eyebrows at comments like this week’s pearler, ‘suck it up Princess’ (directed at one who needs to get over oneself!)

And it reminded me of some of those truly ‘choice’ (the English would no doubt say ‘cracking’) sayings that I had under my belt when I arrived ‘off the boat’ that captured the essence of a sentiment in the way only an Aussie can:

(Best I warn you here: if you would rather avoid references to swearing and general, unlady-like behaviour, you should stop reading now)
Feeling like a shag on a rock – the shag being a bird of the feathered variety – does not mean I would like to have sex in an uncomfortable place but rather that I’ve been (to use another metaphor) ‘left out in the cold’.
As useless as t*ts on a bull – which has now been replaced by the more genteel ‘as useless as a chocolate teapot’ – you get my drift, right?

…and one of my all time favourites…

Don’t p*ss down my back and tell me it’s raining – which is really not for use in anything other than highly-social, alcoholically-lubricated situations but really sums up what the little voice inside my head is screaming saying sometimes.
 
So now you’ve had a peek behind the sunburnt brow of this ridgy didge Aussie Expat.  Shocked?  Well, I may not have painted a very erudite picture, but I’ll bet you wouldn’t have learnt any of that watching Neighbours!

But you can do your bit for British-Aussie relations yourself by clicking here and swotting up courtesy of the The Australian Slang Dictionary.

Then we might actually be speaking the language!

And that’d be bonzer mate…

A Conscious Incompetent…

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This week I started my new job and I find myself back in that uncomfortable place of Conscious Incompetence…when you know that you know absolutely nothing.

Without a shadow of a doubt there’s some Unconscious Incompetence there too (I don’t know what I don’t know) but that doesn’t count because I don’t know about it…yet!

And this has all been combined with some god-awful jetlag which resulted in me hitting – no, head-butting the wall vigorously and repeatedly about Wednesday.  (What a joy I must have been to be around!)

So I’m frantically trying to muster some of my Competence (Conscious or Unconscious – I really don’t mind at this point) to offset that first day at school feeling of ‘how on earth will I fit in’ and ‘what will be my contribution to this new community’.

A bit like when I moved here 7 years ago and began ‘Life in the UK’…

…and here I am, tap tap tapping away in my front window and taking a brief few moments before the inevitable Sunday evening maelstrom of getting ready for the Work Week whilst watching entertainment of the mindless, sparkly variety (currently Dancing on Ice for those of you who don’t live in the UK).

Now that’s something I know about!

ps…I’d also like to take this opportunity to welcome 2 new followers to the Gidday From The UK peanut gallery…Lil Chicky and Anji.  Hooray! Bonza! You Little Ripper! and all that…now settle in and make yourselves right at home!

Lazy Saturday…

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It’s a been quiet Saturday so far, gratefully received after a ‘big one’ last weekend and a mid-week, impromptu ‘red, red wine(s)’ session which took me a good sleep on Thursday night to recover from but was hugely enlightening from a getting-to-know-my-workmates-more point of view.

My first on-line grocery shop arrived promptly and without any horrendous substitution errors. (Someone at work told me they ordered wine and got baguettes???  Now THAT would be disappointing!)  Sainsbury’s Online may just become my new BFF.

So I’m tapping away here with some Kylie tunes in the background before I head out into the chilliness (yes, people, the snow coat is out!) to be reunited with my phone (it’s been a looooong 3 weeks) and buy the Saturday edition of The Times. 

I love a lazy Saturday…

ps…only 28 days to go peeps…that’s 4 weeks ’til we all talk turkey and dis’ the fat man…the widget thingy never lies!