I am Australian. I come from the land of dangerous animals… of deadly crocodiles and sharks and jellyfish and snakes and spiders… all of which I never really worried much about when I was in Australia.
But here in Austria… the ticks freak me out.
Tiny little creatures, they are. Innocently bumbling around in grass and foliage on the forest floor. Not too smart, not too fast. But since you don’t feel them bite, they just hang out on you for a while… gorging.
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I recently went back to work. And it was great. But it was weird… and weird in ways I wasn’t expecting. It was great to be greeted by some familiar faces. But amongst the sea of faces… I couldn’t help thinking one thing… everyone got old!
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My son just turned one.
My son… that still sounds odd to my ears. But there’s no denying there’s a little guy upstairs asleep right now!
It’s a big milestone, they say. Well… yeah. It’s been a hell of a year. There’s some relief at hitting one year old. They say the first year is the hardest. Now we can drop the breast feeding if we want. Now he can eat table foods. Now he’s going to walk and talk and trade Bitcoin and drive a car…
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My parents recently visited for the first time since Covid hit back in 2019. So it was an emotional time already, and in addition they were meeting Sam. It was great to have them. To have some help at home. To have some Aussie in the house. And to give me a chance to flex my legs and do a few things I’d been nervous about doing on my own. We went to cafes and supermarkets and the swimming pool… and we also went away.
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One night when we were out at dinner, as the waitress walked away from us after taking our order, she threw an offhand comment back over her shoulder. Nothing out of the ordinary. But when hubby asked me what she’d said because he hadn’t heard and I told him I had no idea, he was surprised… but you laughed?
Yes… because here’s another skill I’ve gained in living in another language: the ability to know (most of the time) what reaction is expected of me, even if I don’t understand the words. I guess we all do it unconsciously anyway – following the visual cues and tone of voice to know how to set your face and how to react.
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I love swimming. So naturally I want my kid to love swimming. However, due to the time of year he was born and Covid, he didn’t get his first official swim until recently. I dutifully made a plan – I bought swim diapers and a UV swimsuit – I packed towels and snacks – and I prepared for it to be a disaster. Because I went along knowing full well that my romantic notion of taking him swimming would not come to fruition.
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When I was a teenager, I didn’t just go through a dirty poetry phase, I also went through a standard poetry phase. Though this one lasted a bit longer, since it seems I was writing bad poetry up until my early 20s.
The reason I know this is because when I went through some old stuff at my parents last year I came across my poetry book. This, of course, is an A4 book filled with all my best poetry written out nicely. It even has a print out of a Dylan Thomas poem on the front. Because I have like… intellect.
I guess it was a way of expressing myself during the tumultuous teenage years, privately of course, because most of these I never shared. Most of it is amusing, much of it brings back bittersweet memories of a time I’d almost forgotten, and then there’s that tiny percentage that actually carry something more intense. Because every now and again, reading certain parts would expose a surge of leftover pain that still actually stings, in a distant far off kind of way that is the past.
So what better thing to do with this tragic writing I discovered than share some excerpts so you can enjoy the main themes of my teenage life:
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Moving on from my last post on the food I still import from Australia, part of the reason that this list has reduced since I moved to Austria, is because I discovered that some of my essentials could be sourced more locally. So when I head to Italy or the UK, these are the top ten foods that fill my suitcase:
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As the years have ticked by in Austria I have managed to leave many of my Aussie-food-isms behind. Part of the reason for this is that logistically it’s difficult and expensive to ship things from Australia. Another part is that I have adapted to the food here and to what’s available. It’s nice to bring back or receive Aussie food on the odd occasion. But let’s be honest, I don’t need it. I can survive without it. Also being close to the UK means that it’s quite easy to get many of my favourites – or at least acceptable versions of them. But not everything. Here’s the top 10 things I still bring back with me from Oz when I go.
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I feel like it’s been a long road back to normal for me. It was only recently that I went to the supermarket without a mask. Most people waved goodbye to Covid ages ago, but having a young baby (and also never having had Covid) meant staying vigilant. It was my choice, of course. But having a child just as the rest of the world was emerging from Covid meant essentially extending the lockdown.
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an aussie in austria 