See ya, mate!

Ok, in case some of you are wondering, things look set to change a bit for kamidisini in 2008. we’ll be going flying home on Monday, and while the Hasbern returns to Perth in early January, Ilhan and I will be here to usher in a new member of the family (insya Allah) and stay on till….whenever…haha

Thing is, WA is experiencing a major boom sending living expenses for a growing family almost impossible to cope on a measly self-funding international student budget. The rental crunch is especially bad, with the rental agents and landlords going *ka-ching* and grinning evil-ly all the way to the bank. A 2-bedroom villa/apartment/house which was probably $160/week just a few years ago is about $260/week now, and it just keeps getting worse. Factor in the costs of childcare, groceries, petrol blah blah blah, there you have it.

And lest some people start extolling the virtues and benefits of being permanent residents here, we are not. Yet. Insya Allah that will come through sometime next year, tapi itu cerita tahun depan.  Even so, we don’t look at things through rose-tinted glasses. Nature’s nice, beaches are empty, space and pace is good, but survival comes first, no?

All our baby stuff are back home in SG anyway, so that’ll save us a lot. And you can’t beat good ‘ol mother, mother-in-law, nenek, nenek-in-law pampering that you’ll get…haha…:P

 
And so, Perth has been an amazing learning experience. We saw the good, the bad and the downright ugly. I am so going to miss my indon pengajian group, who (unlike some fellow countrypeople) sees me through thick and thin.  Yang baik jadi teladan, buruk jadi sempadan dan memang pengalaman ini telah mendewasakan. We are grateful for the nice people who touched our lives in our way or another, and the intangibles which have made the 3 of us closer as a family.

 

And so these past week has been a mad flurry of sorting and packing – apa nak pack, apa kena jual (sebenarnya bab ni pun ada orang nak ambil kesempatan...manusia eh? ), apa nak buang, apa nak kasi Good Sammy, apa nak minta tolong jasa baik orang simpankan. and making a list of what we shall eat when we get home…hehehe!

 

I’ve so many stuff to update before we leave on Monday, but our ADSL connection has been down for almost a week (biasalah tu, try get anything to move fast around here). Primus said something might be wrong with our cable – kena gigit tikus kot – so right now we are relying on s.l.o.w dialup. Jadilah.

 

KFC and SGD$1.20 masala thosai….here we come!