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On Saturday I will be flying back to Europe for a short business trip, visiting the company’s head office in Munich for a 4-day technical seminar.

Although I am travelling via the UK, there’s no time for a stop-over — sadly I’ve only got two hours at Heathrow to change planes on route to Germany. But that should be enough to fill a bag with “essentials” that Sara is missing.

I arrive in Munich on Sunday morning so, depending how jet-lagged I am, on the way to the hotel I might take a detour to Kirchtrudering, the site of the air crash.

I’ve been playing a teach-yourself-German CD in the car on my way to work for the last couple of weeks, so hopefully I’ll get by with the lingo. In fact, I tested a phrase out on one of the German guys at work the other day and he looked shocked that I might be able to speak the language… I think he wondered what I might’ve overheard when I’ve walked in on their conversations previously.

It’s a heck of a long way to travel for just four days though, I’ll be knackered next week.

Sara isn’t impressed about being on her own for a few days, especially with Andy & Johanne on holiday in Queensland next week. So this week we’ve doused the house with Baygon and she has her emergency contact numbers in case of creepy crawlies.

I’ve just arrived back from another three-day business trip to Sydney, my fourth trip in the last two months. I haven’t changed my mind about the place — I still think it’s a dirty, overcrowded dump (with a very nice harbour area).

Highlights of this trip:

• The Qantas CityFlyer service was better than previous trips on Virgin Blue, with inflight entertainment and complimentary refreshments. We finished our scheduled work sooner than expected and were able to change our tickets to an earlier flight easily enough — there’s a flight to Melbourne every 30 minutes.
• I’m beginning to get my bearings: I now know the best route to Melbourne Airport from home (approx 50 minutes away) and could probably find my way to the Sydney office without using TomTom, if I really had to.
• In Sydney, Hertz gave me a shiny new Toyota Camry instead of the usual Ford Falcon/Futura hire car. Both models are as big as a whale, but the Toyota is a different class entirely.
• As a repeat customer I’m now given vouchers for complimentary drinks whenever I check in to the usual hotel. I also found a few new bars and restaurants in Parramatta, only a few minutes away by taxi.
• Sydney taxi drivers are utter lunatics; the worst I’ve encountered anywhere in the world, except for Egypt. Assuming they know where they’re going (which isn’t always the case) they weave in and out of busy traffic at high speed, as if playing some kind of arcade game. Last night the driver decided to speed down a long service road running parallel to the main road; unfortunately he didn’t bother to slow down for any of the many speed humps along the way before casually swerving back into the main flow across four lanes of traffic.

The main plus point from this trip was last night’s visit to the James Squire Brewhouse, a fantastic restaurant/microbrewery on Kings Wharf. As guests of a key supplier, we enjoyed steak and seafood whilst working our way through the superb beer menu.

Sara and I will definitely be paying a visit to their sister restaurant at Melbourne’s Docklands in the near future.

Woohoo! Today was my first pay day since June!

It’s been tricky living on savings since we arrived, with all the expenses of moving abroad, paying six months rent, furnishing the house and buying two cars. It’s nice to finally see money going IN to the bank after so much has gone out recently.

When I received my payslip, I made sure the payroll clerk explained all the calculations and deductions — I didn’t want to accidentally be put on emergency tax, like I was at the College for several years.

Aussie tax rates are a little higher than the UK — part of my salary is taxed at 40%, eek! — but there are fewer “stealth taxes” once you’ve been paid.

Everyone has to pay a basic 1.5% Medicare levy, which is a bit like the National Insurance contribution. On top of that, if your household income is more than a certain amount you have to pay a further 1% Medicare surcharge unless you have taken out private medical insurance — we’ll look into that in the near future.

The only other deduction on your payslip is for your superannuation fund — a compulsory 9% of your earnings, paid into your nominated private pension fund by the employer.

G.S.T. on goods is only 10% over here, rather than the 17.5% V.A.T. in the UK. When you take into account things like fuel prices, cheaper car tax and insurance and that there are no ridiculous taxes like “TV licences”, I think we’re better off now even though we pay a bit more income tax.

Everyone has to submit an individual tax return at the end of the financial year, so there’s plenty of scope for reclaiming some of the money you’ve paid for things that could be considered necessary for your work — i.e. lots of I.T. stuff for me. I’ll blog about that nearer the time when I’m doing my tax return.

The other strange thing over here is that if you’re paid monthly, you are usually paid in the middle of the month: two weeks in arrears, two weeks in advance. Very strange. I’m not complaining though, I received a six-week salary today even though I’ve only been there for four weeks!

This week I’ve been working from the company’s Sydney office. That sounds very glamorous when compared to my time at the college, where a business trip might have involved visiting the Coppice Link centre or a rare trip to Wigan or perhaps Lancaster. But in reality the long working days, living out of a suitcase in an anonymous hotel isn’t exotic at all.

Being based in the Parramatta district meant that I didn’t get to see a great deal of the city itself, although I managed to squeeze in a fabulous lunch at Café Sydney, with spectacular views of the harbour and bridge.

Like most Melburnians I’ve met, I didn’t really like Sydney much though: it seemed loud, busy and a bit dirty. Comparing Melbourne with Sydney is very much like comparing Manchester with London. The traffic was absolutely horrendous and the weather was sticky and humid, with the temperature touching 40°C.

I suppose Sydney may seem a nicer place if you visited as a tourist, with plenty of time (and money) to enjoy everything on offer. It’s only an hour’s cheap flight from Melbourne, so I’ll give it another go with Sara once we’re ready for a weekend break later this summer.

We’re both exhausted after the first week in our new jobs — returning to the daily grind is a bit of a shock to the system when you’ve had such a long break.

Although we’ve thoroughly enjoyed our time out since arriving in Australia, you can definitely have too much of a good thing. It’s really nice to be out and about again, interacting with people and thinking about real things. Not to mention earning some money, after living on savings for 4 months.

We planned to celebrate by going out on Friday night, but we were shattered so just had a couple of drinks at the pub and then grabbed a takeaway. Today has been really busy too, so we’ll save our celebrations for another time. We have, however, been shopping this afternoon and treated ourselves to goodies that were normally off limits on our tight weekly budget.

Travel arrangements have been quite tricky this week. Although we both work within 10kms of home, we travel in opposite directions to get to work so it’s been difficult managing with one car. Rather than setting off really early and dealing with the busy morning traffic twice, I’ve been dropping Sara off at Bayswater station and she’s been getting the train to Ringwood — it’s only two stops away. After work I’ve been picking her up but, because I don’t finish at a fixed time, she’s been hanging around waiting for me. It would be much easier if we had two cars.

Edit: We’ve sorted that situation out today, I’ll blog about it separately later in the week.

Unfortunately I’m unable to blog any details about my new job because of the nature of the business and the terms of my contract. All I can say is that working in such a focused business environment is a real breath of fresh air and I’m looking forward to the challenges ahead. I’m buzzing at the moment, constantly learning about the technical and production environments. Things should settle down next week, especially once I’m able to remember the names and faces of everyone I’ve met so far.

Agh, only 36 hours of the weekend left.

Well, being a “house husband” didn’t last long, did it? I barely had time to sit down and watch Oprah and Dr Phil, never mind tidying the house.

I’ve got a job too!

I’m the new I.T. Manager for a large German-owned company who manufacture Chip-and-Pin bank cards and mobile phone SIM cards. I’ll be responsible for network links to a number of high-profile customer sites, as well as looking after the I.T. facilities at Melbourne, Sydney and Fiji. I start on Thursday morning.

Further celebrations are definitely in order tonight.

Our long holiday is now officially over. Sara’s got a job!

After watching me apply for literally dozens of jobs over the past four weeks and go through the ordeal of about 10 interviews all over Melbourne, it was typical of Sara to fire off a single application last Wednesday, have an interview on Friday and today find out that she starts on Monday.

The company, MEGT, is one of Australia’s largest training organisations. The job is based in Ringwood, about 10 minutes away. It sounds very similar to Sara’s previous job at Oldham Chamber.

So, unless I hear soon from one of the companies who have interviewed me recently, I’ll be a “house husband” from Monday. I really don’t fancy that much at all — I know what will be expected of me.

We haven’t decided what to do yet, but we’ll certainly be celebrating tonight.

Well that’s it. We’re unemployed.

After working at the college for nine years, it was a strange feeling leaving the building and knowing that I’d never be coming back. I thought “I bet I still drive towards college on auto-pilot one morning” but then I remembered we’ve sold the car too!

I did the rounds on Thursday afternoon, showing my face in various offices and saying goodbye to people who might not be coming out for a drink with us on the Friday afternoon. Then on Friday morning I got a mention in the Principal’s end-of-year speech — err yes, I suppose I am “going down south” in a manner of speaking — and then people gathered in the office to wish us well and present us with leaving cards and gifts.

Wow, I’ve never seen cards with so many good luck messages; they were completely full and had to overspill onto separate cards. It was overwhelming. With a limited amount of luggage allowance when we fly, it was nice to be given the money rather than a present we might have struggled to take with us. Thank you everyone.

Pete gave a nice speech and then I said a few words, once again being completely unprepared despite having two years to think about it. Sara got away with just a “thank you”. I’m sure everyone knows how much we’ve enjoyed working at the college and how much we’ll miss everybody, even if I forgot to mention you at the time.

Then we wisely skipped the college barbecue and headed up to Walkabout in Oldham for our boozy send-off. I honestly planned to take it easy but struggled to keep up with all the drinks that people kept buying me. The afternoon flew by, there just wasn’t enough time to speak to everyone but we had a whale of a time. We moved over to the Litten Tree at some point in the evening but by about 10:15 I was wrecked, so said my final goodbyes and staggered home (literally) with a kebab. Sara managed to stay out ’til all hours, singing and dancing until her feet were sore and she lost her voice.

Saturday was, predictably, a complete write-off.

It’s been nearly two years since we first started the emigration ball rolling, but we’re now finally in our last working week at Oldham College. It seems like we’ve been talking about it forever - I can’t go anywhere on campus without someone asking “how long now, Nick?” and I’m usually able to tell them exactly how many days to go.

The answer today is “3 days” as we both finish work on Friday lunchtime.

So this week is all about handing things over to other people within the department. I don’t know who will be replacing me: I’ve purposely kept well out of all discussion about that subject. The job is definitely available though and all of the Network Support team have been invited to apply. Whoever gets it will leave a hole somewhere, so there are likely to be other opportunities elsewhere.

Most things are already organised, but I’ll have another meeting with Pete and Jon later this week to tidy up any loose ends. I need to sort out my desk drawers and get all the important paperwork into some sense of order. I need to cancel things like my DSL and work credit card. I also want to spend a few hours acquainting myself with some of the technical things that the department have implemented which I haven’t been able to try hands-on for myself.

Yesterday I was invited to the Learning Resources department’s Staff Development Day. I was told that they wanted to raise a few issues that had been causing problems in the Learning Centres this year. It was a set up. When I got there they presented me with a card and a bottle of wine and thanked me for all my efforts, it was totally unexpected and really nice of them. They’re a good bunch of people, always cheerful, enthusiastic and patient with the students (and techies). Hopefully some of them will keep in touch.

It’s a strange feeling quitting your job when you’ve not got another one lined up. It was very scary at first, but I’m quite relaxed about it now. I’m just looking forward to a few weeks off while we settle in and then I’ll set about finding work. I’ll only start to panic when the savings start to run out.

On Wednesday evening I went out for a farewell meal with a group of other managers from the college.

We went to the Blue Tiffin Indian restaurant on Shaw Road. It’s an odd place: Perched in the middle of a retail park, it seems completely out of place, but inside it’s quite contemporary with lots of glass, beech and leather furniture. I’ve probably eaten there a dozen times and have always enjoyed the food and atmosphere.

Ten of us made it this time: Bob, Roger, Jeanette, Angela, Jacqui, Dave, Tony, Jim, Sally and myself. It was a very enjoyable evening, sharing funny stories about my time at the college and having a good old grumble and gossip. The lamb jalfrezi and mushroom pilau rice was, as always, superb.

At the end of the evening, Dave presented me with a remarkable hand-drawn cartoon - “Nick’s Adventures in the Outback”. The attention to detail is incredible, he’s a very talented artist as well as a thoroughly decent bloke. Sally, whose aunt lived in the same Melbourne suburb we are moving to, gave us a cute pair of cuddly Koalas.

It was nice that so many of these people were able to make it. I’ve really enjoyed working with them all, particularly this last couple of years once I’d grown into the role and things weren’t so stressful. They’re definitely the “good guys” at the college and I hope I find as decent a bunch wherever I end up in the future.

Edit: I’ll upload a scanned version of Dave’s picture as soon as I can.