A Few Personal Thoughts

A Few Personal Thoughts

I am still trying to process through this massive life-change. If you know me at all, you would know that I am not one for change. I am quite content to be doing the same routine, working the same job, and even eating the same things. I find what I like and I stick to it.

God clearly has a sense of humor: He gave me Josh—the absolute opposite of routine. Ha. Josh has brought so much balance to my life, though, and I am SO grateful for it. I know, if it weren’t for him, that I would have never taken this leap. 

In saying all that, this still is a push on my character. I would be lying if I didn’t say there has been times where I wanted to give up, turn around, and go back to what I know. (I can say that the Fijian airport was CLEARLY one of them!)

This evening, as I was running our neighborhood, I felt like God was trying to show me a few things. Let me preface by saying that running has become one my means of therapy in the past several years. I have used it as an endorphin release and as my outlet during times of craziness.

As I was running up one of the final hills before reaching home (the hills of Bella Vista are NO small task, to say the least) I felt such a great rush come over me. I felt like these hills were like the obstacles that Josh and I have encountered while trying to get here—unforeseen costs, my visa issue, the lack of jobs, the uncertainty of our finances – these all seem like such daunting and overwhelming issues that we have no control over but we just keep pressing through and persevering. Our strides seem smaller and our strength seems so weak yet I know that God is here to meet us and give us the strength that we need. We keep climbing, we keep fighting, and I know that we will overcome these hills. AND, when we make it to the top, everything will be in a whole different perspective and we will know that we did it only by His strength, guiding us bit by bit.

I am so thankful that I am not doing this alone. I have a husband who loves and supports me and encourages me no matter what.  He has been so steadfast.

And, we have a God that loves us through it all. I know, without a doubt, that He will take care of us. He has never left us yet and His hand of grace is so evident in our lives.

 “And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2 

The Cafe

The Cafe

So… I (Laura) got a job. Yay!! (Everyone should be cheering with excitement! Hehe) I work at a cafe about two miles from our house. Since we don’t have a car I end up walking to and from it, which ends up being a nice added exercise. I started working there last Friday and I really like it. It’s a very fast-paced environment so the time flies by.  As Josh is doing school, he will only be working part-time; I will end up having to get another job to supplement us. This job works out pretty great though because I only work until 1:30/2pm and so I have the afternoons free to do something else.

The café has AMAZING coffee. Australia, in general, has probably the best coffee I have ever tasted. I have heard from others that when they went home to the States, that they were so bummed to go back to the coffee there. As a perk of the job, I can have as many coffee drinks daily as I would like as well as any sandwich or wrap. What people consider a regular coffee is a bit different over here; you can either have a “flat white” or a “long black.” The “flat white” is the closest to what we would say is a regular coffee yet seems to be far more fancy; the “long black” is similar to what we call an “Americano.” Frankly, I am keener on the cappuccino but they are really all good.

For the most part, the people I work with are great. There are a lot of Hillsong students there as well as some Hillsong attendees. I work with a girl named Jess who is from Washington state and she is in the same boat as me; her husband is doing school full-time and she is working. She has been super helpful in my training process. There are a few girls that can make work unpleasant.; let’s just say that I am really learning how to show Christ’s love. J Apparently, they hate newbies because they are “annoying.” Hmm. Who knows.

My boss is an interesting character. He is only 25 but definitely looks a bit older. He comes across very serious but yet has a very sarcastic side. I am trying to find a balance of keeping work work and learning how to joke. He has come up with a new nickname for me: Laussie (pronounce Law-see)… I have NO idea where that came from. Ha.

The regulars (customers, that is) know I am new and tend to give me a bit of a hard time, yet they are still very understanding. I have gotten a few comments from some of them that I look European. One even said I look Eastern European. I have never heard that before in my life. Interesting. 

What they REALLY mean....

I thought I would try and give you a fun/funny post to read about Australian lingo. I can honestly say I have been TOTALLY American in my response to some statements that Aussies have made; I really have no clue what they are saying sometimes! But, before I do that, let me show you some pics (that really should have gone with the last post).

Here's our bedroom. Forgive the clutter but we are living on "functionality" 

and I'd rather not "accessorize" when our money needs to first go to bills 

and then to traveling :) 

Our back patio

Mal and Jenna (two of our roommates) 

My (Laura) first time sitting on the passenger side in Australia.

 (Doesn't this just feel wrong?) 

Just for kicks: our first visit to Harbour Bridge 

the night we arrived.

Sydney Opera House (Sorry for the blur.) 

Ok... so the lingo... haha! I am even chuckling just thinking about it!
So, Josh forgot to clue me in on some of these sayings but the scenarios make for great story telling. :)

The first one I heard was "no worries, mate!" Now upon reading this, I am sure you can easily figure out that this means "you're welcome" or "no problem" but within the context I heard it, I immediately though and then responded with the most serious face... "Worried?! Who's worried?! I'm not worried!" Ha! Josh just had to laugh at me.
Another one my housemate said to me was "Oh, good on you!" Of course, at first, I look down at my outfit and think that she is referring to what I was wearing... I smiled, taking it as a compliment until I realized that she was definitely NOT referring to my outfit (as I am CLEARLY out of style here) but rather meant "good for you!" (Encouraging me on the productivity of my day.)
That same roommate and I had a later exchange, after saying hello to each other, where she said, "How you going, Laura?" Now, at this point I am thinking, "How am I going? Well, let's see, I don't have a car quite yet so I probably will be going by foot around here for a while... but what does that have to do with anything!?" BUT, I was smarter than that and didn't respond with that answer! Ha! Of course I asked her to clarify what that meant and it means "how you doing?"
Perhaps you are all a bit smarter than me and don't take things quite as literal but I can honestly say I am sitting here laughing hysterically as I recount these stories.

Here's a few other words that are a bit different (some took me a little while to figure out.. sometimes I had to ask):

Chips-- french fries (Potato chips are called crisps here, much like England)
Footy-- Australian football (I'm not quite sure what this is yet but it's not rugby and it's not American                football)
the boot-- the trunk of your car
a bludger-- a slacker or someone who doesn't give a lot of effort
uni-- the term for university or college
rego (hard g)-- the term for your car registration
Ute (pronounced you-T): a pick-up truck
Postie-- a postman (here they drive around on these 50cc motorbikes...kind of funny to watch)/ or a piece of mail that you want to send out
Spit the dummy-- get angry (a dummy here refers to a pacifier/binky)

Also a "fun" fact here... damn and hell are not considered swear words here and so, therefore, are used quite often... I quickly figured this out! :)

I am also finding myself saying certain Australian things so as to not stick out like a sore thumb as an American. These would be: toMAto sauce instead of ketchup, cutlery instead of silverware, liT-Trally instead of liTERally, and capsicum instead of peppers.

I definitely have many more culture shockers to tell you about but I will space them out for you so you aren't spending too much time trying to get through my blog posts.

Living, Driving, and Jobs

LIVING

I said to Josh the other day, “I feel like we are moving backwards in our living situation.” We have shifted from living in our own little apartment as a newly married couple to now back living with a bunch of college students. Oh well. It is saving us money.

We are currently living with six other girls: a Canadian, an American, a Chilean and three Aussies. People say, “Six girls, huh?” I always respond, “Ya, well, it’s better than six college boys!” These girls are pretty settled, all 21+, and “sparkling” clean.  They all are great. Let’s just say, there is never a dirty dish left in the sink. That should say it all.

We live in a rather large room off the kitchen with sliding doors to the back patio. Furniture was included. The only things we ended up having to purchase were sheets, pillows and a comforter. We share a bathroom with Stephie, the Chilean girl. It ends up being a pretty great setup.

The house is pretty huge… definitely enough room to fit all eight of us; we are hardly ever all here though. This works out for us pretty well for now.

DRIVING

Driving has been a bit of an adjustment. They drive on the other side of the road so for the first day I was gasping at every turn as I was thinking we were turning on the wrong side. Sitting in the front seat was so weird; I kept trying to slam on the breaks and grip the steering wheel. Our Aussie friend, Dylan, had a bit of a chuckle at me.

Australia also has a thing for roundabouts; they use them instead of traffic lights as keeps the flow of traffic continuous. If you have hard time with car sickness, this is not the country for you… the roundabouts are around every corner! I am still having a hard time deciphering which way to look for oncoming traffic in those things.

Mal, our Canadian roommate, let me drive the other day. I didn’t ask, mind you… she offered! I cheerfully and nervously accepted. Josh was not keen on it. Her car is a little Holden Barina… it’s comparable to an old four-door Ford Festiva. It is a standard so that made for some extra fun. The stick is in your left hand verses your right. So, not only was I learning to drive on the other side of the road, but also had to figure out how to do stick on the opposite side. The blinkers are also on the opposite side too so every time I indicated to turn, I was turning on the windshield wipers. Ha. I did ok with the roundabouts (as there is about five of them in the half mile we took to the store) but as far as how I did, let’s just say… we made it to the grocery store and Josh has determined that I need way more practice.

JOBS

Job hunting has been a bit stressful. I need to keep in mind that it has only been a week that we have been here. As I mentioned before, we have had some issues with my visa so we are waiting on an approval from the government for me to work. Because we have no car, we are trying to keep within walking distance. I have applied to a few cafes around the area, the preschool at Hillsong Church, and a couple of other childcare places online. The most success I have had was from an ice skating rink down the road that needs someone to do birthday parties. At this point, I’ll take what I can get.

Josh has applied at a few places in the area as well. I think he is waiting until he starts classes this week to figure out what would be the best for him.

Keep us in your prayers. We have had some setbacks and we are trying to stay positive. God is still in control. 

Josh and I have both decided that we will not be flying for a bit.  We have had enough “flying adventure” to last us a while.  Packing up our life into four check-in bags and two carry-ons is really not an easy task. Can you guess whose items dominated most of this space? 

We have flown a total of five planes in mere two weeks and have had quite the “turbulence” along the way. It started with checking into LAX for our Fiji-bound flight. We spent at least an hour packing and checking… and then rechecking… to make sure that our check-in bags weighed no more than 50lbs each so as to insure no overweight baggage fee.  We were perfect. … of course we were both wearing the heaviest items we owned and probably wearing too much clothing for a tropical island but we were determined to not be over that weight limit!

Low and behold, who knew they would weigh the carry-on luggage as well! We were TOTALLY over our limit and ended up dishing out a whopping total of $180 in overweight baggage fees. (Did I mention that we trying to stick so much on budget that Josh refused to rent a cart for $5 that would help us wheel our six bags around. So much for trying to be cheap! Josh almost fell over a couple of times with all the baggage he was carrying.)

                                                                  Waiting in line at LAX

This whole ordeal cost us a great deal of time in getting to our flight and when we finally arrived at the terminal, as passengers were boarding, Josh realized he left his baseball hat back in the security check-in, waaaay on the other side of the airport. Lovely. None the less, we made it to Fiji.

Leaving the Fiji airport made LAX seem like a walk in the park.

We made sure to get to the airport with plenty of time just in case there were any hiccups with baggage, etc. Apparently that was worthless because Fijians are known for having their own pace for everything… they call it “Fijian time.” Josh and I watched the guy behind the check-in counter rearrange everything on the desk, dust the whole counter, go for a bathroom break, and then dust again for about twenty minutes before deciding he was ready to check people in.  We had to laugh. When we got to the counter, the lady serving us kept swiping our passports through the machine. She must have done this about ten times.  “Problem,” she said. Uhoh.  “There is a visa for you, Joshua, but not one for you, Laura.” “What are you talking about?!” Josh responded.  Well, apparently the visa was declined for me for some odd reason and I could not leave Fiji.

That was it! Josh was headed off to Australia and here I was left to fend for myself on a remote island in the Pacific. (Don’t get me wrong… Fiji is beautiful… but I was ready to leave.) I was panicking.

The lady assured us that we could quickly fill out paperwork for a new travel visa now and we could get on the plane. So, we went over to a free computer behind the counter that no one was using. Twenty minutes later, we finally figured out which paperwork to fill out. After we completed it, we needed to pay a processing fee. Well, just our luck, our credit card didn’t work….our debit card didn’t work… we couldn’t pay for the travel visa! Panic! We had exactly 15 minutes to figure it out, check in our bags, and race to our gate to board the plane.  

We finally discovered that we could use paypal and that saved our day.

When we raced back to the counter to check in our luggage, our weight limit was over.. surprise…surprise.  This time, we ended up paying $630 Fijian… yes, far more than what we paid at LAX… same airline and everything. APPARENTLY each “port” can charge whatever they like for baggage fees. WHAT!? Well, we had no choice but to pay it. We weren’t going to stay in Fiji any longer.

At this point, you would have loved to see the beautiful interactions that Joshua and I were having.  Ha.  Pretty sure Josh threatened to leave me in Fiji, visa or not.

I don’t think we spoke two words to each other that whole flight.

In the end, we made it to Australia. We have yet to resolve my visa situation so that I can work (to make up for all the money we spent on baggage fees).  OH, and we did discover that some Fijian airport workers decided to take home some of my undergarments from my luggage to their wives.  Lovely.

God is in control. We will laugh at this some day… just not today.