Learning to boil an egg

I read today in The Times (yes, I have the app on my ipad) that one in seven students entering into university cannot boil an egg. Now, I haven't read the Daily Mail's article about this, but I can be fairly certain that they have made it into some big 'the youth of today' article condemning all youths as irresponsible thugs. No, its not all idiotic lazy teenagers who live off junk food, nor is it students who have been in boarding schools all their lives who fit into this category of 'hopeless dependents' - I also could not boil an egg before I went to university. I made a scrap book which had on the front page 'a boiled egg takes four minutes!' I wish I was joking. The point I am trying to make, is that just because freshers may have never done their own laundry, picked up an iron, boiled an egg, the world is not coming to an end. We are not a degenerate generation. I managed to teach myself how to cook, do laundry AND got a degree. It is not difficult.

Three years ago I couldn't boil an egg, could barely navigate myself to the end of my street, and yes, I did manage to end up in Newmarket when trying to get to Swindon from Durham, yet now I am responsible for three children under the age of six and mercifully they are still alive.

When thrown into the deep end, be it university or moving to the other side of the world, we an adapt and if someone has managed to get into university (or get themselves successfully to the right terminal at the airport) we can assume they are intelligent enough to learn how to boil an egg. Hopefully.

Frauline Maria I ain't

Is it the fact that I live in a bungalow that the rain is really, really loud or is rain, like everything else in Australia, bigger, scarier and more dangerous here? Anyway, as the lightning peaks through my curtains and the thunder roaring so loud that I swear I just felt the bed shake (and no, not for the reasons those of you with a dirty mind are thinking of) I am starting to doubt my abilities as an au pair. I feel lightyears away from Maria Von Trap from the Sound Of Music, singing about ones Favourite Things' to the little darlings as the crawl into my bed on such a perilous evening. Rather, I am wishing I wasn't home alone, and cursing myself for being such a big baby. If I can't cope with a bloody thunderstorm, how am I supposed to look after three children?! For now, I shall hum to myself whilst thinking of spaghetti bolognaise, Pinot Grigio and Justin Timberlake. Ooh I feel better already...

Sydney here I come! (maybe)

After a relatively sleepiness night of thunderstorms and worrying that I will forget something really important, like my flight ticket, I was up and ready to go at the crack of dawn. HM and HD said I need only 90 minutes to get from the front door to the airport, but I know myself, and being me, anything can and invariably will go wrong. However, not today! Here I am, sitting at Terminal 4 with yes, a ridiculous amount of time to spare. Now normally this would be fine; I can spend hours wandering around the duty free, reading magazines in the corner with no intention of actually buying them. However, not at this airport. I mean, I wasn't expecting much, how can you when HM expressed her concern with me flying Tiger Airways, when they have only just reopened due to some issue with pilots not managing the, what should be standard for pilots, procedure of landing the plane safely. However, HD said as a pilot, he would have no problem with me using Tiger Airways and quite frankly, it was cheap. But this terminal has only a vending machine and a coffee outlet to buy a skinny latte, leaving me wishing I had eaten more than a solitary apple for my lunch. Oh, and I am pretty certain that these plastic seats are not designed for anybody over 20kg. Think EasyJet and then take it down a notch or ten. Yup, that's me! Let's just hope they have retrained the pilots, or else this may well be my last entry on this undersubscribed, rambling fiasco that is my blog.

hasta mañana amigos! (hopefully) xxxx

The difference between Australia and England

Although I am living on the other side of the world, it barely seems that way. Australia feels comfortably familiar, yet different. We drive on the same side of the road, eat similar foods, speak the same language, yet the subtle differences between us Brits and Aussies, is becoming increasingly evident. My first lesson was never to take your shoes off in the house. They will think you are pretty weird, and rather rude.

Now, I am going to contradict myself here, but the biggest difference I have noticed in my short time here is the language. Yes, they speak English, but some of the terminology and language they use is so unfamiliar, that I am often staring at HM and HD with such a blank expression that I am sure they must think I'm sleepwalking half the time. I'm not, I promise. But when HM asks me to make sure all the doonah's are clean, what am I supposed to say? Oh, of course, a doonah is a duvet! Duh! And capsicum, snow-peas...what are these?! I feel like such a hoon! (Yes, my point exactly.) Oh, and they love to abbreviate literally everything. I used to think that the stereotype of Aussies with all their "G'day mate's" was reserved for the surfer-dude who hangs out on Bondi Beach, but the 'lingo' is used by every Aussie out there. Even Australian Ebay greets me with a G'day which will never cease to bring a smile to my face.

Another startling difference between Australia and the UK is how polite, happy and welcoming people are here. Not that Brits are all grumpy old buggers, but even going to buy half a litre (not pint!) of milk, the shop assistant will always ask how your day is going, how you like Australia and how your second cousin twice removed is. People seem to genuinely want to help you, which is proving to be rather detrimental to my financial situation because I find it hard to change my mind about buying something after the shop assistant has spent an hour and a half trying to find the perfect fit jeans for me (Levi's men's skinny fit - FML) Must resist the amazing shopping mall painfully close to home...

Even after just a week, I can see why so many Brits hop over the pond to live in such a beautiful country. Ok, so I am judging the place after six days, but being here as a resident rather than a tourist, it feels like Australia has all the home comforts of home (Tetley's included) but with the added bonus of amazing weather and amazing people. Maybe I will become one of the 24,000 Brits per year who go to Australia and never come back!

Week one: Nappies, Terrible-Twos and Thomas the Tank Engine.

HELLO!

Here I am, back by popular demand! (Yes, my mother, who fears that spending all my days chasing children around the garden and collapsing on the sofa at 8pm to watch Australian X factor will turn my brain into mush, and should therefore blog in order to prevent such horrors)

Week one into my crazy adventure's as an au-pair in Melbourne, and I am utterly convinced that this is possibly the best decision ever. I get to spend every day playing tag, eating Vegemite sandwhiches (crusts off, of course) and playing on the swings in the park. It certainly beats moving in with the parents struggling to get a job in Tesco's! My 'host family' as the au-pairing world call them, are absolutely wonderful. They are full of life, love and laughter and after just five days, I feel utterly at home. Except for the fact that I am no longer the youngest, and I have to act with a certain level of responsibility (shudder) and maturity (shudder!) 

Host-Mum (HM, from here on) and Host-Dad (HD) are fantastic people, who have made me feel so welcome and the kids are full of energy and life, sometimes with a little too much energy for my liking! I blame it on jet-lag, but I think the transition from spending everyday slogging my guts out in the library to running around in the garden playing helicopters is a little bit of a shock to the system. On the plus side, running around all day after them is burning billions and billions of calories. Theoretically, I should be a size zero when I return to mother England. 

This is possibly the first time I have had the opportunity to sit down and contemplate my first week in Australia. Life as an au-pair for three children under the age of six is full on! However, the family have gone to Noosa, Queensland for two weeks and I am free to explore what Melbourne, and the rest of Australia has to offer. The house feels eerily quiet without Justine Clarke playing in the background (if you have young children, you will know who I am talking about!) and without one, two or all three of the little munchkins wanting a piggyback/Vegemite sandwich/nappy changing. Yes, I have, for the first time in my life, changed a very smelly nappy. I don't know what all the fuss is about. I had geared myself up for this horrible explosion of poo everywhere, baby screaming her head off, me up to my arms in Sudocream, antibacterial gel and talcum powder. It was fine! How is it that men make such a fuss over changing a nappy? Maybe I have been very lucky with this child, but now my biggest fear has been overcome, I feel a fresh wave of relief flowing over me. Just don't give me a new born. Green poo is just a step too far. 

So now I have the house free, I am suddenly wandering what to do with my time. There are no children to entertain, no washing up to be done and little laundry to do. I guess I'd better go sit in the glorious sunshine and read Bill Bryson's 'Down Under' and enjoy the quiet, because who know's how long it will be until I get such tranquility again when the family return from Noosa! 

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