Oh my gosh. I am in Australia. Its taken my a while to get to this post because hey, moving is difficult. Even more when everything you know or think you know, turns out to be ‘inaccurate’ at best! You would imagine that coming from Malaysia and having lived and adapted to a British culture, things should be easy…(cos maybe I was ‘exposed’ to it, used to it, blah blah blah). Er no. This major milestone did not come without culture shock! I could list a few…
Shops closes at 5pm, let me explain…in Malaysia, I could ‘hang out’ and do window shopping after work. I enjoyed this because I know the shops are there to drown any frustrations and mend any wounds when that particular someone steps on your tail. I was further spoiled by Tesco’s 24 hour shopping in UK. This means I no longer need to q along with the blue and white collar folks who straddle into the shops after work…I could go at 10 pm! Heck, at midnight if I had a craving for brie and cranberry rolls! Here…despite the government allowing merchants to continue trading after 5pm…most still decided it’s far better to go home and put the barbie on and have a beer by the pool. At least that’s my point of view.
Ham instead of turkey …. yeah. Even in Malaysia, my parents would buy a turkey for Christmas. And that’s special considering that there aren’t enough locally (Malaysian) bred turkeys to supply the ever increasing western influence to a Malaysian Christmas menu. Being married to a British made it even more special since I look forward to the left overs on boxing day for a hearty turkey and cranberry roll. Here, its Ham. Barbecued ham…with cranberry! Don’t get me wrong, I love it just as much!
‘Barbies’. Every house has one! Or it seems like it! Its the height of summer and what do Aussies do on a freaking hot Christmas and New Year’s Day? ‘Pull out the barbie mate!’. In Malaysia, be it gas or charcoal, barbies are done mainly at night. The idea of cooking out in the heat just doesn’t quite have a Malaysian appeal. But I had a go anyway, so we did it the Aussie way, we had a barbie in the freaking hot outdoors. Will I do it again, yeah, actually I think I would.
Prepaid cards for mobiles. I can’t find any vendor that sells a prepaid card outside the CBD (Central Business Center) or the city center. In Malaysia, its Digi here, Maxis there…erm, a gerai by the road side in a kampung would be selling a prepaid card! And just my luck, the first day we arrived, we ran out of phone credits with Digi so we couldn’t call a taxi to pick us up to get to the CBD or call any of our friends and with no public phones insight, we WALKED. Took us a whole hour to get there. Yep, in Malaysia, I would probably be admitted into the A&E ward for walking in the heat. Oh that leads me to the next point…
Its hot. I monitor the temperature on my desktop screen, Perth vs Kuala Lumpur. 1 out of the 34 days I have been here, Perth is cooler…by 5C. Maximum temperature on our car gauge was 43C. Just before we got here, we were monitoring the temp gauge in our car in the UK…and it hit -11C…yep, more then 50C difference. Today the temperature is 25C, in a couple of days time it will rise to 36C again. Getting used to it though…the nights are pleasant…I’ll have a night here anytime, back in Malaysia … its just too humid.
Amah….oh, do I miss this privileged life! An amah is not a servant or a cleaner. An amah is a life saver and a super woman. I am now appreciating my little electrical helpers like never before; a dishwasher, a washing machine, a tumble dryer, a vacuum cleaner and the dvd player(plus Toy Story 3, Shrek 4 and Nemo) to keep a certain little miss busy while I busy myself with the ‘On’ buttons of my handy helpers. And all at the expense of several …. a lot of…aussie dollar bills. I fall short of calling in help from home…. I will survive!! (A note to my mom: I now know why you get frustrated when we leave our cups on the table and not return it to the kitchen.)
Hahahaha. I can list a lot more but let me just end it here…why, because I can whine (a lot)….and one thing I miss most from Malaysia, is the Limteh sessions (a.k.a. coffee/teh tarik sessions). Those blessed or cursed to love it …know that its not the tea or the coffee or the food that makes a good limteh, its the whining!!! I’m having a cup of coffee now (raising it) ‘So, here’s to all who decided to move, whose in transit, those where change is the only constant thing in life, those who managed to juggle life and children and a clean and tidy household, those who decided that 2011 is going to be different … and better!’
Happy New Year…..mate!! … and No’ worries…. 
