Either Side of the World

It was about a month ago now. My wife and I were walking along Prins Bertils Stig, an 18km pathway that begins at Halmstad Castle in Sweden and runs along the coastline for the most part. We had been discussing (for some months now) what our next move was in life. We had been mostly focusing on moving to the UK, because it was closer, easier and it seemed to make the most sense. We had been avoiding the idea of leaving Sweden for Australia because, well, I’d been there and done that and she doesn’t like the heat, so the idea seemed ridiculous.

Then this conversation happened.

“You know, even though it doesn’t make sense, maybe moving to Australia would be the best option right now for us.”

“…You wanna do it? You want to move to Australia? Like…now?”

“…Yeah, alright.”

That was all there was to it. A week after this conversation, we bought plane tickets to Australia. 12 days after that (I won’t fill you in on the multiple breakdowns of those 12 days as we attempted to pack up our lives in Sweden), we jumped on a plane, and then another plane, and then another plane (the joy of 27 hours of travelling, and to think this was the quickest possible itinerary – we literally got off one plane and ran onto the next) and last Friday we found ourselves back in Australia, only a few months after we were last here.

To say it is a little surreal would be an understatement. I for one never thought I would be here again for anything other than a holiday, but considering we have planned to be here for at least a full year this is no vacation. And for my wife, well, she’s a true Swede through and through who was born in a snowstorm, loathes the heat and is terrified of spiders, so living in Australia for a long period of time probably wasn’t on her agenda. Not to mention that we are going from Spring and Summer back into Spring and Summer (and a real Summer too…no offense Sweden).

Still, we’re going to enjoy it and make the most of our time here. We already have a car (a super old Audi…guess we’re clinging to our European-ness in any way we can), we’re slowly finding our way around the supermarkets to find food for my wife’s very Swedish palate (and, to be honest, my tastes in food have changed in my absence from Australia), and we’ve already squeezed in a couple of trips to the sea. Australia is a beautiful place, and if this really is going to be the last time I consider myself as living in Australia then I want to make the most of it and show my wife the wonders of the place I grew up, a country I will always consider a home.

After this very approximate year here, we’re going to swing back by Sweden for a month or so to say hello to everyone (especially all the people we never even said goodbye to – good grief folks, whatever you do don’t leave a country at such short notice like we did because it’s far too upsetting) and then we’re going to head to UK to spend some time (at least a couple of years I suspect) there.

So, for the time being we’re back down under. I miss Europe already, but if all goes to plan we’ll be back around this time next year. It had better not snow too much up there this year, otherwise I’ll just have to post lots of pictures of the beaches here to make you all jealous.

In my next post I’ll discuss some plans I’ve had brewing for the blog to keep this going while I’m down here! These plans even involve books…remember when my blog used to be mostly about books? Yeah me neither but anyway let’s see if I can return to those days.

Goodbye Sweden, for now. We’ll be back soon. I took this photo at Galgberget in Halmstad just a few days before we left.