Hey! Look at the strange creatures we have in Brisbane! I was really happy to find these three lovely creatures in George Street, Brisbane. The sculptor, Chris Trotter is very good and you can see more of his work on his website http://www.trotter.com.au/homepage/index2.html Have a look. I always enjoyed the street sculptures in China and have been pleased to see that Brisbane has progressed in that area since I have been away.
Archive for the ‘Home Again in Oz’ Category
Wildlife Brisbane!!
Wednesday, April 9th, 2008Four Boxes Arrive
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008
Most urgent in my mind again is getting my house in order. It has become messy with the arrival of four of my boxes from China. I despaired when I saw the condition the boxes were in. They had been subjected to very rough handling indeed. I’ll put a photo on the blog. Part of it was that the Australian Customs Service had opened one and not sealed it up again very well but every box showed signs of having been thrown around and all were torn in some place or other. It was a big relief to find that most things were undamaged, particularly my most precious items. I was amazed that an ornate teapot set I bought in Shanghai had little damage. Five out of six little cups are unbroken and the teapot is intact. A pottery ockarina I bought in Beijing is broken but I was unable to play it and I had little attachment to it. I knew I had not packed it with care as one of the last minute additions and am not surprised it did not make the journey complete. One thing I am a little sad about is an ornament one of my first students gave to me for Christmas. It is a metal ‘Chinese gate’ with three bells hanging from it and a small hammer to ring them. The inexpensive metal it was made of broke under the handling the box received. Perhaps I can glue it but it will never be the same.
I rejoice that my most precious things among those which have arrived are intact. The lovely carved map of Hubei that Amy gave me and The china rabbit given me by Rita. My lacquer screen bought in Xi’an is no worse than when I packed it. It is in need of restoration but I don’t know where I can have that done yet. Pictures rolled and put in long cardboard boxes have travelled well. My books are safe and so are my Chinese learning CDs although one case has fragmented. Two nice bowls given to me by Catherine are in good condition as are my two Korean metal chopstick and spoon sets.
Lots of clothes arrived but most are suitable for winter in a more severe climate than Queensland’s. I have put them in a backpack which also arrived. I had to reassemble it and fit the metal frame back in it. Now it is stuffed with jumpers and jackets. The remaining two boxes have my Guan Yin statue and tripod but they mainly contain my lovely minority cloths. It should not be long before they come. As I write one of the last two boxes has arrived, but not at my home yet. I expect the other to arrive this week and my son will bring the two over here together. Then I can find ways to put beautiful cloths on the walls, it’s something I love in my homes.
Home and Well
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008
OK my friends, it’s time I let you all know that my medicine is doing a great job of keeping me well and that the long process of moving into my home and organizing all my stuff is almost complete.
I am living in a lovely bayside suburb of Brisbane and can walk out of my house, stroll down to the end of my block and walk along the foreshore for kilometres, or as far as I want to go, looking at the sea. For those of you who don’t know the area, Brisbane sits on Moreton Bay, a large Bay whose outer boundary is formed by North and South Stradbroke Island and Moreton Island, islands largely made of sand in a very unusual natural phenomenon. Not far north is Fraser Island whose unique landscape is formed exclusively of sand. There are other smaller islands within Moreton Bay. This is part of the sea and sky scape I watch in wonder as I stroll along finding relaxation, peace and healing from the visually jarring urban landscape, unhealthy air and noise of Wuhan. My soul and body are finding healing here and it is not just the exercise and medicine that is doing it. Even though I am in a suburb of a city of over a million people it is a healthy place.
I also love the smell of incense (xiang) and often burn scented candles, use scented oils in an evaporator and burn fragrant incense. The best incense is made in India and I can buy it very cheaply in this area. I am sure the scent is also a healing and restful influence in my life lately.
My home is full of furniture and goods which almost miraculously appeared from relatives, friends and from shops at bargain prices I stumbled upon. There are still some gaps but even today I happened upon two bargains, one of which I visualised about two weeks ago as a thing I needed but didn’t think such things were made any more at a price I could afford, a chair that converts to a useful small portable staircase. As I intend to hang some of my lovely Chinese cloths on walls and put at least one more shelf up it is essential. I walked into a second-hand shop today and there was the chair stair I had visualised. Wow! Am I being looked after or what?
Remember my experiences at the Post Office as I sent six boxes to Australia. (Read my blog about it.) Well, it wasn’t three months but it was well nigh two and a half and not all the China was broken but the boxes were a terrible mess. I’ll post the story separately. It’s already written elsewhere as part of a writing exercise I have given myself to keep me focussed.
You might remember my medical problem is a damaged heart that is arrhythmic and promotes fluid build up in my lungs. This is complicated by diabetes that I allowed to get right out of control in China. Now my sugar levels are brilliant every day and I feel almost normal in my energy levels except I cannot lift anything heavy as I once could and I can’t walk as fast or walk all day without stress as I once could. The many pills I take every day are working very well and enable me to keep up a level of exercise that might restore strength and better functioning to my heart one day.
The only setback lately is that I also bought a motor scooter and enjoyed riding it so much I neglected to walk for a few days and today when I started again I became a little more out of breath than a week ago! Daily walks are on again. However, it is great to have some cheap transport. Now I am on a Disability Support Benefit (once called an Invalid Pension) and will learn to manage on that while hoping to pick up a little more income here and there. I don’t believe I could handle even a part time job in any field I have experience in so here’s hoping that one day my writing will change from a hobby to work. It would be ideal as I could set my own timetable and number of hours of work.
Now I have a small backpack again my camera will be going to work, partly for fun and partly as another hope for a small income. Expect photos from time to time so you can see something of this lovely city but for now I will leave you with the assurance that I am back on track health wise and settling in to Australia again very well.
Countdown to the move
Wednesday, March 5th, 2008Three more days before I move into my new home. I have been given a lot of household things and furniture but have still had to spend a lot of time reading catalogues, visiting shops, talking to salespeople and finally buying things that are just plain necessary for a householder. I can’t imagine how I would have done if I had no savings at all. By the time I actually move into the place there won’t be much left but I’ll have a place that not only feels comfortable but looks good. That’s important to me. It will have my style stamped on it, even to the extent of disguising the floral pattern of my lovely mother’s good quality three-seater sofa with a couple of Indian cotton bedspreads and a beautiful Yi minority patchwork from China.
I’ll have all the necessities to cook and to eat what I cook and I’ll be able to wash clothes and clean floors. The Queensland government will chip in $200 because I bought a washing machine that is economical in both power and water. However, so far I haven’t arranged for the connection of power and gas and the internet. So far I haven’t been able to make the choice of internet service provider though I have found a site that makes it a little clearer. At least I know that the only company that does a proper national wireless internet service is Big Pond and it is way out of my price range. Now I have to choose a way of getting a home based fast internet service. More research tomorrow as the decision is urgent. After a weekend of arranging my home I will knuckle down and take a professional approach to writing.
The advantage of being regarded as pensionable is that I have a financial base, albeit not one which will keep me very comfortable. That will enable me to build up my writing experience on a hobby level at first and then to the point where I bring in enough money to say goodbye to the pension and become part of the respectable workforce again. There’s the plan, that and being healthy enough to have reasonable quality of life.
My bedroom is furnished and the living room is taking shape. I have two desks but no table to eat from just yet. One of the desks will do at first. I’ll buy a mattress on the day of the move so I’ll be able to sleep in the sheets, under the cool weather quilt, with my head on the pillows that I bought. Sometime next week I’ll be blogging from my new home.
Australia’s time wasting phone companies
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008A task that used to be very straightforward has become a complex mental maze today. That is the task of getting a telephone service. It seems to me that Australia’s blind faith in Competition has failed the consumer in this area. The easiest component is the landline, but even with only two service providers competing householders have to find a plan that suits their needs. That sounds good doesn’t it? However, not being an accountant or one of those people who keeps track of every penny and counts phone calls, I have no accurate idea of what my needs are.
It is still worse when one goes to choose a mobile phone service. With numerous companies competing there is a great variety of plans on offer and, frankly, I and most consumers find it a tedious and time-consuming occupation to sift through them all and try to process them so as to truly understand which is the best. Once again, an accountancy degree would be handy. The ability to use a database programme really well might make comparisons easy but unless we have a real understanding of how many local, long distance and international calls and SMS messages we will make in the next year or two there is no way we will finally make an intelligent decision. In the end most of us just find the nicest salesperson to agree with and hope for the best.
As for the strange and supposedly attractive practice these companies have of giving free calls to people who use the same company, do we take a survey of our friends before buying a phone? Yeah, right.
The internet is also a branch of telephony and the situation there is no better. It is still possible to buy a disk that gives a certain number of hours online, but that seems only to apply to dial-up, the slowest way to get online. Broadband can be connected through the phone line or cable and of course there are plans for those two. This time we have to be tech savvy and beaurocratic enough to guess or know how many gigabytes of information we will upload and download over the term of the plan. No way!
I went into a store to sign up for the wireless internet a nice salesperson had recommended the other day and was asked to fill in a form. I had guessed my requirements but the form defeated the seller’s purpose. First I had to put down my home address and my previous address and how long I had stayed there. Four weeks did not seem to be acceptable for the present address. It is only temporary, till I move into my next home. The previous one is in China and they would not understand it if I wrote it. I was required to put down a home phone and did not have one. I have a mobile but for some reason these purveyors of high technology had not understood that some people just don’t want a home phone these days and can be contacted through a cellphone. When I realized that a credit check was required I walked out of the shop. Since I was cheated in China a few years ago I have had a bad credit record, even though I paid my credit cards out as soon as I was financial again it makes no difference.
In the end my question is this. Who foisted this Gordian knot on the Australian people and why? Who is gaining from the impenetrability of the mass of information required to make a good choice of telephone services? How long are we going to have to put up with this unwieldy and unfriendly situation? When are we going to be able to walk into a shop and buy a connection or a phone which will let us make local, STD and ISD calls as we wish, without having to sign up for ’special’ deals and study for days to choose what we want? When will the government realize that the cost of the time taken for Australian people to choose a phone service must run to millions of dollars annually? Let’s change to something simpler.
Author’s note: If anything in this blog does not accurately represent the situation regarding telephony in Australia it is the author’s opinion that it proves his point.