No wonder they win the Olympics

Robert and Owen had their Sports Day at the end of last term. It wasn't how I remembered Sports Day. For starters, they started their day with an inspirational talk from a genuine Olympian (I forget who she was) and a chance to hold the actual olympic torch from the Sydney Olympics. All we had to motivate us was earning house points for Hillary, Chichester, Scott or Churchill. Ooh.

The sports themselves, as well as the usual sack race and egg and spoon race, were proper athletics events. The school was divided into 4 teams of different colours. Siblings were put in the same teams, Robert and Owen in the greens. Parents, teachers and children all really threw themselves into it.

And the main difference? None of this namby pamby, "it's the taking part that counts". It was all good natured and a lot of fun, but make no mistake; they were all trying to win.

Brass Monkies

Autumn is setting in here which, to our sensitive Northern Hemisphere sensibilities, is a bit strange.  It does feel like it should be Autumn, but it doesn't feel like it should be May.  There are lots of European trees around to go brown and red to make us feel at home.  The photo above is from Hahndorf, Australia's oldest German settlement, where the main street is lined with trees like this.  There's even a brochure giving the route of a tour around the hills just to soak in the colours.

At the same time as going cooler, there's been quite a lot of rain, so suddenly all the scenery that was browny-yellow is green, and flowers are starting to bloom. You can smell autumn, but it smells of spring at the same time too.

Our house has only one built in heater/cooler, which is fine for the main living area, but means the bedrooms are freezing at night.  Especially our bedroom, which has 2 walls to the outside.  Houses here are generally pretty flimsy compared with the UK's.  It's very unusual for the actual structure to be made of brick.  They're usually a wooden or steel frame with a brick veneer.  Nobody has double-glazing.  In fact, lots of people have genuinely never heard of double glazing.  To be fair, it will only get as low as 5 degrees C in winter, so there's not much call for it.  

So, in response to the chilly weather, we did what any good group of Taylor's would do: went to the beach.  With my mum's eternal phrase "I've sat on beaches in worse weather than this..." ringing in my ears, we decided to drive to the beach which is the very closest to our house.  We hadn't bothered with O'Sullivan's Beach before as it's next to an oil refinery.  I had visions of oil covered birds and washed up plastic containers, like they always seemed to have on John Craven's Newsround, just before the final article about how Pee-Pee the Panda moved one leg slightly towards Ding-dong from Beijing zoo, who they were trying to mate it with.

It's actually a great beach, with sand dunes ace for doing stunts on, and choppy seas that produce a foam which Robert and Owen spent a good hour chasing.

All we needed to make it the full Taylor beach experience was a picnic in blue plastic boxes from Dad's work, an orange, yellow and blue windbreak, and Dad's turquoise trunks, which he must have worn each year for at least 20 years.  Maybe next time.

Things that are different in Adelaide #1

South Australia is the only state in Australia in which Coca-Cola is not the top-selling soft drink. 'What could outsell the mighty Coke?', I hear you ask. What has managed to penetrate the public's consciousness more than the world dominating corporation, one of the most recognisable brands in the world? Another Cola? A power drink? The elixir of life?

No. It's cold coffee.

Farmer's Union Iced Coffee, to be precise.

Available in light, regular, Mocha and Extra Strong, South Australians sup on this like no other drink. Everyone has it. Workmen, Doctors, housewives, business execs, it's all pervading. Goodness knows why. Hot coffee in whatever form you like it - Flat white, Soy Latte, Long Macchiato etc. - is widely available everywhere you go, the espresso machine having been as much the norm as in Italy here for ages.

I've tried one, at the insistance of my colleagues and in the interest of soaking in the culture. The verdict? It's alright. Just a bit, erm, well, cold. Personally I'm not into milky drinks, so I'm not the best qualified to comment.

So instead, I just enjoy the fact that the world isn't completely homogonised by the big brands, and order a cappucino.

http://www.farmersunion.com.au/

The story so far

I'm not sure who knows what about our Australian adventure so far, so forgive me if you already know any of this.

After making everyone cry at the airport, we left on 12th January, stopping off for a few days in Hong Kong, where we saw the city, Disneyland, and a giant Buddah. Next to Starbucks. Neon signs, skyscrapers, smelly dried fish and ferries. We arrived in Adelaide 15th January, just 4 months ago. It feels like a lot longer.

 We were made very welcome in the home of Sharon's cousin Gareth and his family, who really helped us out and we'll be forever grateful to. Sharon had a brief trip back to England for her Grandad's funeral. We found a really good church, Trinity Bay, on our first Sunday and have been going there ever since. That has been fundamental to us feeling settled here. The boys enrolled in the Primary school near Gareth's, and I stated working at a Hospital in February.

At the end of March we bought our own home in Woodcroft, a

bout 30km south of the city centre. It's a modest (by Australian standards) 3 bedrooms, one bathroom single storey with a big garage and an outdoor all weather entertaining area (although, how you entertain snow I don't know). We Aussie-cultured-up to the max by buying all our furniture from, erm, Ikea. Owen has started a new school here, which he loves (his teacher at his 1st Aussie school was truly awful). Robert has stayed on at that school until the end of the year (his teacher there is truly wonderful).

Last week our 55 boxes of personal effects arrived from England, so we're now busy cosying up our house and making it home.

The verdict so far? We love it here. There is so much we miss about England - people (the most), places, events. But this still seems to have been the right thing to do. It's been difficult sometimes, and sometimes we're just plain old homesick. But it's been exciting. It's been so good for us to be stripped of all our security blankets. We've learned to enjoy the present with all it's inconveniences, rather than getting stuck in the 'everything will be ok when...' mindset.

We miss you. Come and see us!

Alterations as usual during business

Thanks for taking the trouble to sign in to be able to view this site.  We just thought we could have more freedom in what we post if we know it's only invited people viewing it.  I know I've cringed at some of the things our Richard has written in his blog, worrying about the trouble he could get into if the wrong person read it.

I think I've set it so you can post comments now.  Let us know if you have any ideas about what you'd like to see.

In the meantime, here's a video of Robert and Owen at work in our kitchen.  It demonstrates perfectly a difference between them - Owen is all dive in and get your hands dirty, Robert is much more controlled and precise.  Watch his reaction after putting his hand in Owen's mixture...

The Taylors all used to live within a 3 mile radius of Mum and Dad's, before Rebecca went to Mansfield, Cath moved to Cheshire, Sarah moved to York and Richard moved to Scotland just so he could write a blog. We've taken it to the extreme by moving to Adelaide, South Australia 10146.93 miles Southeast of Burnage.

We hope to use this blog to let you know how we're getting on. There's so much day-today stuff that all adds together to make up our experience here. It's probably best captured a bit at a time. If nothing else, it'll be something for us to look back on.